Animal Urges
by nightflutterheart
Summary: Sequel to 'Lust for Life'. Sasha Buckley is finally forced to embrace her true nature. But trouble is brewing in Manhattan, and she's never been one to just keep her head down. And Eric, well, he's never been too good at stepping aside from what's his, especially if it's being threatened. Rated M for our favorite Viking Vampire. RESUMED.
1. Prologue

_**Prologue**_

Another body. He sighed as he stepped over it, muttering under his breath about the mess it had made.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art was an eerie enough place after hours. Scatter a few bodies in its private wings and it was a total fucking nightmare. He hated museums in general; too many artifacts littered the place, so many cursed it was a wonder his kind hadn't been exposed yet.

He stopped in the doorway of what appeared to be a very cluttered office. Yet another body was strewn across the floor, this one a young male museum attendant half in uniform. He lifted an eyebrow as he eyed the female seated behind the desk.

"I was getting in a final feed before sunrise. This had better be good," she told him, licking blood off her fangs.

"My apologies. I suppose I should have waited until tomorrow night to make good on our deal," he dryly. "I thought you might like to know that the ward was breeched an hour ago,"

"Really? This is what you call me for? A breech in your little ward? These things happen each day, witch. With rising frequency, might I add," she said with a pointed look in his direction.

The witch made a frustrated sound, smoothing down his velour coat with a hand to compose himself. "Not like _this_. Something powerful, something _raw_ has crossed over into our territory. This is a courtesy call to keep your eyes peeled."

She considered this for a moment. Then scoffed, rising from the chair. "Is that all you have to say?"

"It is," he said. "Dismissing this would be a mistake,"

"Then I suggest that the next time you decide to bother me so close to sunrise, that you have real information to share. A name. A place. A threat assessment. Are we clear?"

The witch's gloved hand fell to his side. It twitched there for a moment; the vampire eyed it with wicked smirk, a dare in her eyes. His hand went slack.

"This partnership works because it is built upon mutual cooperation and respect. Don't forget that. If you're pissy, than that has nothing to do with me,"

Her fangs disappeared. "True enough,"

The vampire reached for something on the table. She tossed it at him, and he caught it quickly, a little startled to find that he now held some artifact. He didn't have to be an expert to know that what he held was incredibly old—and incredibly priceless. At it's center was a gemstone.

He turned the amulet over in his hands reverently, happy he had not taken his gloves off when he'd entered the museum. "Scythian? Parthian?"

She laughed. "Hardly. It's older than you'd know,"

The witch continued his careful observation. He moved a hand over the artifact. "It's…it's enchanted," he said. "Warded…protected…"  
He froze. "This isn't…it can't be…?"

"Exactly. It can't be,"

The vampire took the amulet back from him, closing her fist tightly around it. When she opened it once more, the stone around the diamond had been crushed to dust, and only the diamond remained, a quiet sign of her strength.

"A decoy," she said bitterly.

" _No_ ," he lamented.

"You're upset? Imagine spending years—centuries, only to find a bloody decoy," she said. She dropped the diamond to the floor. Seeing his expression, she scoffed. "Small, for my tastes, now that I've found you. You've made me much bigger,"

The witch's eyes did not meet hers just then. He cleared his throat. "Yes, and perhaps it is best if we lay low with the diamond production. The AVL has been trying hard enough these days to get us under their shoe. We don't want to raise more suspicion,"

"I hate when you're right," she agreed dismissively. "Very well. Rest the forge. You don't mind a cold winter, do you?"

"I'll manage," he promised.

"Good."

He ducked his head and turned to leave. At the door, she called him back.

"And darling," she smiled coldly. "If this... _raw power_ becomes an issue, I want to know about it before it comes to that, understood? I don't care if whatever it is just passes through. Chances are, it's nothing to worry about. Anything powerful and with half a brain cell would know to fall to their knees before me and ask to be allowed into my territory. All the same…keep watch,"

"Already on it."

* * *

 **Hey hey hey! Welcome back guys to those that have been on the** Lust for Life **journey! This here is the teaser/prologue; if you think this is short, just know that it's 3 times what the initial information was!**

 **Read on, and welcome to the next installment in the series!**


	2. Chapter 1

_**Not a new chapter, just a reposting of a chapter that was already here. Not too sure what happened to the original, but it was mistakenly posted as the first chapter of Lust for**_ **_Life._** **Thanks Nurisiliel for pointing that out!**

* * *

 **Chapter 1: New Mystic City**

It was a night that most children across the country were the happiest they would be until Christmas. But Sasha Buckley wasn't most kids, and on the evening of October 31st, 1994, she was not a happy camper.

"But you _promised!_ " whined Sasha. "You said I could be _anything!_ " she added a little foot stomp for emphasis, her small fists balled up at her sides. She didn't mean to whine like a little kid, didn't even mean to come across as rude to her mother—but she was angry! And Sasha just couldn't understand why adults were allowed to feel things like anger and frustration and she wasn't—her parents felt that way all the time, especially these days. Why was that only left for them to feel?  
"Little love," said her mother, and Sasha had to withhold a scoff. It was another funny thing about adults; they liked to give each other and their children fun nicknames, but they could make them sound just as cold and condescending as they could warm and loving. Right now, with the tone her mother was using, Sasha took it to mean that she wasn't her _little love_ not one bit.

"You're nine, not five," her mother went on as she scrubbed a big, heavy looking pot in the sink. Sasha wasn't too sure what it was from; they hadn't had soup for dinner. And it smelled awful. "And so you're old enough to know that following the word _anything_ , the phrase _within reason_ is always implied,"

Sasha glared down at her dirty sneakers. They weren't supposed to be on her mother's pristine kitchen tiles, but she really didn't care right about then. Feeling very naughty, and like punishment should be a two-way street, she toed one sneaker to the muddy front of the other, smiling a little when a chunk of mud fell to the tiles.

Oops.

"So what's the opposite of implied?" Sasha asked. She hated not knowing what words meant, or what was happening. Her parents never really explained things to her; her mother never told her what it was she did in the basement, her father never really explained what he did for work beyond 'government', and just really, she was sick of it all. Sasha nine, not stupid, and just because she didn't know what certain words meant, it didn't mean she would let adults walk all over her or change up the rules.

"Explicit. Explicit is the opposite of implied," her mother said over her shoulder. She seemed more preoccupied with her vigorous scrubbing.

"I thought explicit meant bad. Like for movies and videogames and stuff,"

"It can mean that too, but it can also mean very specific." Sasha's mother said as she finally glanced over at her daughter. Her expression turned annoyed. "For example, I _explicitly_ told you not to come into the house with filthy sneakers!"

"And I explicitly said I wanted to be a vampire for Halloween!" Sasha said loudly, pushing one of her mother's soapy hands away from her face when it came to rub at a muddy smear on her cheek.

"Don't use words you've just learned against your mother,"

"Why not?" challenged Sasha. When her mother returned her attention to the sink, Sasha rubbed her dirty hands on her face. Let her be dirty!

But her mother froze

"Because all words have power, and you must be very careful about who you use them against," For a moment, Sasha grew very still. There were moments in which she saw her mother: beautiful, captivating, alluring. And there were other moments were she saw Aliyah, a woman with a dangerous energy that practically crackled around her.

Then the moment passed, and very briskly her mother added, "It's getting late, but there's still time if you want to go out tonight. I left the costume on your bed. Otherwise, you can stay home while the other children have their fun,"

Feeling tears of frustration sting at her eyes, Sasha finally sniffed, "This isn't fair. Jackie gets to go as a mummy! Why can't I be a vampire?"

"Honestly," said her mother, turning once more from the kitchen. "I really don't like your fascination with dead things, Sasha,"

"Vampires aren't dead things," argued Sasha. She stomped out of the kitchen, very loudly yelling, "Or they wouldn't be able to walk about and they wouldn't have to eat blood and stuff! They're not even _real_!"

"Miss?"

Sasha Buckley jerked awake, earning an apologetic smile from the redheaded flight attendant peering down at her.

"Miss, we'll be arriving soon, so if you could, please return your seat and tray table to the upright position," he said kindly. She smiled at him, though more out of reflex than anything, and followed his request.

Sasha was thinking that she wasn't a fan of flying. Truthfully, she didn't have all that much experience with planes; mostly she'd only ever flown from one end of California to the other. For as well read and well spoken as she was (and in several languages at that) Sasha had never done much travelling. When you stopped to consider it, it was a very unusual thing for a girl like her.

And, by girl like her, that meant a young woman that had grown up in the care of vampires. And by vampires, it was a very specific kind: the Kingly sort, with his court and his entourage. But now she was very far from her vampires, having somewhat struck out on her own. She didn't intend to stay away forever; she considered them family, and there had been no ill will between them that had driven her away from them. No, that had all been because of the stifling oppression she'd begun to feel after the serial murdering vampire Bartholomew had been found out and subsequently escaped California. Sasha had decided it was time for her to get out of California, out from the protective web spun by her vampire family, and learn a thing or two about the world on her own. She'd planned to do that in New York City.

She was finally making it out to New York, about four months short of her expected arrival. Sasha had had more than a few distractions along her way, all of which had grounded her in Bon Temps, Louisiana. Sasha had quickly learned that the sleepy hick town of Bon Temps was more than what it appeared: it was a magnet for trouble of the supernatural variety, and it was also apparently Sasha's birthplace.

Until then, Sasha had always thought she'd been born in Washington DC. Her parents had split their time between Washington DC and Louisiana to aid her father's political career (it had worked out; he was now Louisiana's Senator), but as she'd grown a little older, she had mostly remained in Louisiana with her mother when her father began spending more time in the nation's capitol. She'd been too young to realize that the distance wasn't just geographic, but also present in the state of her parent's marriage.

Her mother had taken off when she was eleven.

Sasha had stopped being 'too young' after that. She'd grown up in a strange environment all right, and she had always understood that she just wasn't the same as all the other little girls (or little boys, for that matter) that went to school with her. And she'd quickly put together that her father had realized it too, and it was something that disturbed him. So Sasha had taken off like her mother, without warning, inspired by a strange desire to see the city of San Francisco, and she'd walked and hitchhiked and talked her way across half the country.

Then she'd hit Nevada and everything had changed. There, she'd gotten caught up with vampires. But other vampires, good vampires, had intervened and, when the vampire Malachi, known to most as King Jakande, had offered her a place at his residence she had accepted. She'd led a very good life until the vampire Bartholomew had started on his killing spree. His victims had been young girls, and he'd started using Sasha's nonprofit organization that helped troubled children as his hunting ground.

Back in Louisiana, a state she'd loathed since her childhood, Sasha had only meant to drive right through. But car troubles (and, she dared say, magical intervention) had had other ideas, and who should find her, in the middle of the road having been nearly possessed by a terrible ghost than the wickedly handsome and delectably fascinating vampire Eric Northman? Eric was the sheriff of the Area she had been passing through, and a thousand year old Viking to boot.

Their connection had been instant, and the cause for more trouble than either had been prepared to deal with.

Sasha often thought back to that night. She wondered what might have happened had she not gotten into that car with him; had he not offered to give her a ride. She might never have gotten stuck in town overnight, might have never decided to take care of the ghost that had attacked her, might never have subsequently met the newborn vampire Jack in the local graveyard. Jack had, of course without meaning to, sent her hurtling straight back into path of the Sheriff of Area Five. Sasha often thought, too, that Eric might wonder if he shouldn't have simply sent her on her way, or gone with the instincts of his fangs and drained her dry. That would have avoided them drawing the jealous wrath of another sheriff of the state, Catherine Meridian. Because Catherine, long in love and fiercely obsessed with Eric, hadn't liked the perceived connection between Sasha and Eric, so much so that her progeny had attacked Sasha.

In return, Eric had killed her.

The death of her progeny had only emboldened the already mad Catherine, and to retaliate she had wanted Eric to suffer the deaths of Sasha, whom she believe to be his human lover, and Pam, his progeny. She'd nearly succeeded, using the time that Eric had been away on orders of his King to squash a growing rebellion, but Sasha had intervened to save Pam out of loyalty to Eric. She had saved Eric's progeny, but at a grave cost. Sasha didn't know the full extent of her consequences, but she only knew that she might have raised Hell itself with the Fire that she had summoned, and that though she'd come out physically unscathed, she now had a tattoo of the mystical ouroboros on her body. It didn't often lie still, the snake eating it's own tail, and she feared its significance.

It was all a very big headache, and Sasha didn't like dwelling on the awful events that had occurred up to now. In addition to the death and near-death, Sasha had discovered something of a relative: the ghost of her grandmother, a fellow witch, still haunted the family home just outside of Bon Temps. It had been her grandmother that had introduced her to a stronger knowledge of witchcraft, now that she was ready to know more, but Cookie couldn't explain the other power that Sasha possessed. Sasha was a Fire Affinity, the rarest of affinities in the witch community, and also one of the most dangerous. Sasha had already started several fires that she couldn't control, and perhaps only the elusive witch Emmett, based in Manhattan, might be able to help her now.

The airplane gave a tumble, and Sasha's hands immediately clutched the armrests on either side. Eric had stuck her on a redeye flight so that he could talk to her about what he expected from her (their relationship wasn't as lovey-dovey as Catherine had believed; they were a witch and vampire with a working contract between them) and although she appreciated the first class seat that she had been given as opposed to the economy flight she'd intended to fly out on in the morning, she just really didn't like planes. At her discomfort, the tattoo on her skin moved. She figured his by the heat at her back rolling and contorting—it settled along her stomach and breasts, up—she yanked up her sweater's collar as high up as it would go in horror.

Of all the things that had occurred to her in the past forty-eight hours—and it was a lot, very much so on the verge of _just too damn much_ —Sasha's biggest concern was the ouroboros tattoo that had mysteriously appeared on her skin. Not only was it there, with no explanation, but it didn't tend to stay in the same spot for long; the snake had been somewhere around her left ankle and up her leg and waist when she'd departed from Shreveport.

Sasha was gripped by the sudden worry that maybe it might happen—that someone might spot the tattoo shifting across her skin, that people might figure out what she was. For all that she had ever been, had ever known, Sasha was for the first time in her life gripped by terrifying notion of someone—not vampires or something supernatural—but human beings finding out about what she was, and unbidden, the image of her tied to a stake blossomed in her mind's eye.

If she hadn't understood it before, Sasha had now seen the full destructive force and terror of a fire. It was uncontrollable— _she_ was unable to control it, just like she would be unable to control public opinion, the response to what she was—just like she had been unable to control the Fire in the warehouse. It would burn and it would devour and it would leave her helpless—even now her hands were heating up. She felt her heart rate pick up, tasted ash and smoke in her mouth, felt like her lungs were collapsing—

She could feel a panic attack trying to suffocate her.

Very suddenly, fingers found their way into her hair, their cool tips brushing soothing circles into her scalp. She shivered, eyes sliding shut; no one was touching her, and the sudden tranquility that invaded her body was not truly her own. But she threw herself right into that emotional flood, letting it sweep her away from her own very real, very dangerous emotions.

Sasha Buckley would have been a fool to call Eric Northman a saint, but right then he might as well have been a godsend. Slowly, as she accepted the helping hand Eric provided through the bond they had established through his blood, she regained control of herself. There were a lot of conflicting feelings she had revolving around the thousand-year-old Viking, but right then she was only grateful for him. His very literal emotional support had just kept a plane in the air.

 _Can't rely on it forever_ , Sasha thought to herself as she reopened her eyes. Still, she reached out for that thread of ice that linked her to the Sheriff of Area Five and thought very hard on the feeling of being grateful. Hopefully he would understand. Then she retreated from the bond, shying way before he could read into it too deeply.

By the time the plane landed and she'd made her way to baggage claim, Sasha had ignored three of Eric's calls, and one red-hot snap of their bond that told her he was Not Happy. But Sasha was tired, and after the night she'd passed with him, she didn't want to talk to him—mostly because she didn't know what she had to say to him **.**

Sasha had meant to leave Louisiana that morning; Eric had disagreed. In the end they had compromised, and she had left at nightfall, so that Eric could make the arrangements he deemed necessary for her—she was still, he had very seriously reminded her, _his_ _witch_ , and in this contract between vampire and witch, he still had a say in how _his investment_ was handled. It had, naturally, infuriated her—partly because she felt he was being high-handed, partly because he was being a deliberate asshole.

Still, when she stepped foot out of JFK, she couldn't help but be relieved that her ride to the city had already been figured out for her. As much as she wanted to spurn Eric's need for control, there just was no good reason for turning away a ride into the city and a place to stay. She had bigger things to do than prove to Eric that she could manage little details like that; she had a Fire Affinity to find and convince to train her and, because she was a claimed human entering a foreign territory—claimed by a foreign Sheriff at that—she had more vampire politics to contend with. So no, she didn't care to argue semantics with Eric.

When Eric had told her that he had arranged for her transportation, Sasha had expected to find a car and driver—maybe a black Town Car and uniformed chauffeur. Instead she found—or rather, he found her: a beautiful, beautiful man.

At first, he reminded her of Alcide Herveaux, the werewolf that she had met just days earlier. This man was like the were in that he was tall, muscular, dark and handsome. But where Alcide was more of a rugged, rough sort of good-looking, this man was just too pretty. His eyes were like amber and seductively smoky like whiskey. His five o'clock shadow, though present, was too perfectly trimmed to be anything other than deliberate. His curly black hair curled past his ears, thick and shiny with care, like he spent a very good amount of time on his appearance, though it was out of self-care rather than vanity. His Latin features gave his skin ever-present warmth, highlighted by his dark brown leather jacket and blue jeans. He wore heavy boots on his feet.

"You Sasha Buckley?" he asked.

 _I'm whoever you want me to be_ was Sasha's first thought, along with an unexpected wave of lust. It caused her eyes to widen in surprise, and she worried for a moment that the fire in her belly would turn all too literal.

Her phone rang.

"Yeah, I'm Sasha," she said, and she almost didn't recognize her own voice. It was somewhere between shy and coy—what the hell? She frowned at her feet. Okay, so the guy was pretty— _pretty fucking beautiful_ —but since when did she turn into a dithering mess? If she could handle Eric Northman…

"And I am Luca Emond. Let's go. I have already been waiting enough,"

Now, Sasha might have been used to a certain standard of living—she'd been raised in a royal vampire court, after all. But vampires in general—save for the rogue, newborn ones—generally understood a thing or two about manners, and she had taken to that. But if vampire manners weren't the standard, it seemed that basic human decency wasn't either.

"The flight was delayed," said Sasha, annoyed that she was even trying to explain herself to this rude as hell _Luca Emond_. "Weather, and then my luggage—"

"Didn't ask for a novel," he said gruffly.

Her jaw very nearly dropped.

Oh, and he had just a lilt of an accent, enough that her knees grew a little weak—then he realized what he had said, and she was out like she'd been doused with a fire extinguisher.

"Is this it?" he asked, gesturing to her luggage. Over his shoulder, she saw a Jeep with the trunk popped open. She assumed it was his.

"I got it," Sasha said darkly, not at all pleased by this man's attitude. But he went to grab the largest suitcase anyway, evidently thinking she didn't have it. He reached for it just as she did, and their fingers brushed. The second they did, Sasha wished she hadn't moved; a spark jumped between their skin, and she jerked away from him. The odd draw that she'd felt to him had been replaced by a very dark feeling. It was mutual, she thought, because his thick, dark eyebrows narrowed over his amber eyes.

"What was that?" she muttered.

"What was what?" asked Emond. He was lying, causing her to frown at him. Had she misinterpreted his reaction?

She didn't think so.

"Look, I don't have all night. Your vamp might not think so, but I have my own life to live _princesa_ , so let's get going,"

"Fine," Sasha said coldly. She instantly hated being called _princess_. She watched as he shoved her suitcases into the trunk of his Jeep. It wasn't particularly flashy. His rudeness at the odd spark between them alerted her senses; but if Eric had sent him, well, she trusted Eric. She wondered if that was stupid as she climbed into the passenger seat of the Jeep.

She remained on edge all the way into the City. Even her new surroundings couldn't distract her; though she wasn't unsettled enough into her fear to worry about a sudden fire exploding in the car (actually, for once, the thought of such a thing was very comforting) she remained weary of her driver. She was only roused from this when they passed the Brooklyn Bridge into the City; she felt an odd pressure on her chest, her ears popped, and she shivered. When she glanced suspiciously at Luca Emond, he had blinked once or twice in quick succession.

Strange.

Soon, however, she did find herself distracted. Luca was driving them through a magnificent neighborhood; on one side, it's edges lit by street lamps, was Central Park. On the other, beautiful buildings of the famous Upper East Side stood tall and proud. Luca parked in front of one of these buildings, and Sasha couldn't help her happy grin.

 _This_ was where she'd be living?

Sasha owned a small studio apartment that she'd bought with her money earned working as the Vampire King of California's personal historian. Though it had all been a long-distance purchase, from what she'd seen through pictures and videos sent by her broker it was a small and cozy space in an upcoming section of the neighborhood. She'd planned on renting it out and, if ever necessary, using it as something of a bolt-hole. But Bartholomew had learned about its existence, and Eric argued that it as possible he wasn't the only one that had. He had insisted she accept his offer to use his own personal apartment. He'd also argued that Brooklyn was outside of the Queen of Manhattan's jurisdiction, and it might be unwise to cross the vampire border so frequently. Being what she was, it would draw attention. Sasha had agreed; really, she'd been swayed by the description of the luxury apartment and it's description of the multi-jet spa. Perhaps incredibly disconcertingly, Eric had somehow known exactly what buttons to push.

"Do you think you can handle it from here, _princesa_ , or do you need me to come up and tuck you in, too?"

Emond had long since stepped out and deposited her luggage on the sidewalk. Sasha's happy smile dissolved, replaced pursed lips.

Okay, what the fuck was this guy's problem?

She stepped out, striding around him and going straight for her luggage. "I think I'll manage just fine," Sasha said icily. "Thanks for the ride," _Jerk._

Fuming, she dragged her bags across the wet pavement—it had rained, unsurprising for November—and a part of her hoped her driver would just try to insinuate he was owed a tip of some sort. But he didn't, and she heard a car door slam and an engine hum to life before she'd even made it to the front steps of her intended building.

Inside, Sasha's pleasant mood was restored. The doorman was kind, jumping up to help her luggage immediately. At the front desk, a pretty brunette vampire smiled at her, greeting her in a way that was warm for vampires. She verified Sasha's identity through ID, then dutifully handed over a spare key to Eric's apartment. Maureen, as she was called, also gave her a quick rundown of the building's amenities; it had a gym that led Sasha to learn the building was mostly human, as well as a pool and spa room towards the middle of the building.

That Eric really wasn't so bad, was he?

It was as she rode up to the penthouse suite that Sasha remembered her dream. It came to her unbidden, triggered by nothing more than an easy blankness settling across her mind. She frowned at the memory of it; the memory was a little hazy, and she couldn't even remember if she'd been allowed out of the house that night or not, although she vaguely remembered a lot of yellow taffeta and chiffon.

 _I really don't like your fascination with dead things_. Sasha had to smirk darkly at that. Oh, if only her mother could see her now—a fascination with dead things wouldn't even begin to cover it. Her smirk faded just little, her expression turning thoughtful. At nine years old, Sasha hadn't understood her own _fascination_ , she hadn't known that the very creatures she'd grown so amused with, likely from some cartoon or movie, existed, walked the very ground she did, only at night. But her mother, a witch, would have known. She supposed she could have understood why she'd been so upset then. Witches were highly weary of vampires. What creatures weren't?

 _And once again, I'm living in the house of one_ , Sasha thought. Her mother wouldn't approve, but certainly she did not care enough. If she did she wouldn't have walked out on Sasha. Right then, a very childish urge sprung up in Sasha; she wished that Eric Northman was waiting for her right upstairs, so that she could do things to him that would make her mother _very_ upset.

Then she thought of the night before, and she was flooded with very conflicted feelings.

The childish, if not fucked up, moment passed when her phone rang. Again, it was Eric, and again she ignored him. While she appreciated everything that he had done for her (and was continuing to do) she thought it would be best to take a step back. They'd grown too close too fast, and her blood bond to him, though incomplete as he had never had her blood, was already too much. She had drank his blood, and they were already closer than she had ever intended. Eric _fascinated_ her just a little too much, and thanks to what she was, who he was, it just wasn't a good idea. Sasha was a burgeoning witch; she trusted Eric with her life, but she had to learn to be more prudent with that. Eric was all too easy to fall for, and it already frightened her, the loyalty he had inspired in her. They took unnecessary risks for the other, and Sasha thought that they could easily grow fatally intoxicated by the other.

After all, last night she'd nearly been willing to—

 _No_ , Sasha told herself. _Stop thinking about last night. You didn't, and that's what matters. It was not a moment of total weakness._

And that was how she had *intended it to be. She was in New York, she was on a mission, and she didn't need a sexy Viking Vampire distracting her with the possibility of something that could never be. Yet the second she stepped foot inside of his apartment, it was impossible not to think of Eric Northman.

It was, much like the vampire himself, stunning. The entrance opened up to a large space, with such tall ceiling it would make even the tall Viking feel small. The wall through which she entered was entirely red brick, likely the original twentieth century brick of so many of the city's buildings. Sasha shut the door behind her. On her left was a small piece of furniture; it looked like it might hold shoes, and she used the ceramic dish on its surface to drop her keys as she continued to admire the apartment.

The main space was the living room. A large but old TV had been mounted to one white wall, and the outdated piece told Sasha Eric either hadn't been by in a long time, or that since he had he hadn't cared enough for television to update what he had. The sitting area was small; it didn't seem to be an area Eric had for entertaining; there was only one couch, a soft grey piece that would fit two people (three if the Viking himself weren't one of them) that looked perfect for sinking into. Beneath the couch and live-edge oak coffee table was a plush white rug. There was more oak; the ceiling beams were made of the timber, as was the small table that created a divide between the living room and the kitchen. Oak, Sasha knew from a book she'd once read in Eric's apartment, had been commonly used for Viking longboats for its association to the god Thor. She paused at the table to finger the live edge; it was an odd thing to think about a table, but Sasha thought that there was something very personal, almost sensual about the carved piece.

Next she turned to the kitchen. It was a mix of grey marble, white gleaming cabinets, and silver appliances. Surprisingly large for a vampire's home, it pointed once more to the fact that the building had originally been intended for humans. In the city such a large kitchen was a luxury; perhaps Eric, who had clearly renovated the apartment, had left it intact in the case he planned on reselling the home. Such a beautiful kitchen would only heighten the home's value.

Sasha lingered a little in the awning of one of the beautiful windows; there were four windows, the glass very clearly thicker than ordinary for a vampire's safety, and they looked out over the clustered trees of Central Park. It was a gorgeous view, and she bet it would be splendid in the morning to have her morning coffee right in that spot.

Moving through the rest of the house, Sasha was pleased to find a room that acted as both an office and small library. Quite a few books caught her eye, and quite few classics she thought, were first additions. Not unusual for a vampire to own, especially not one as old as Eric, but only primary residencies tended to have valuables. Had this been one, at some point, for Eric? She wondered if he had lived her before he had become Sheriff. She found a bathroom and a storage closet, as well as, oddly enough, a locked door. The bed wasn't even made. She found Eric's bedroom at the end of the hall and of course it was beautiful.

It was very big, with a brick fireplace across from the bed and two large windows facing the city center. A mechanism near the wall obviously made the room light tight and, in the center of the room, was the biggest bed Sasha had ever seen. It was almost excessively large, even for the Viking, and she eyed the thick fur blanket—another nod to his heritage, surely. There was an oak nightstand on either side, after the same live-edge style as the kitchen counter tops. Opposite the windows was a matching dresser.

There was an en-suite bathroom with the promised multi-jet tub. Like the bed, it was enormous. Sasha grew distracted for a moment in the bathroom, enjoying the pristine surfaces and noting that, like the kitchen, a human concession had been made: a toilet. There were two sinks, though they shared the same long mirror. Only half the bathroom seemed to be in use; she found that only the left side of the cabinets had a few items in them.

Then Sasha found a very important room. The closet. It was _enormous_ and it was two whole flours if you counted the gallery. She was amazed by it, and she turned on the lights as she went, curiosity taking over as she peeked at Eric's clothing. They were all on the left side of the closet and, unlike what he wore now, it looked a little preppy. The Eric that had lived in New York City had worn more suits, more cashmere sweaters, and slacks and long coats. Sasha loved the sight of him in a pair of leather pants, but she did grow curious about what he might look like dressed in these things. Then, if a little gloomily, she thought _fucking gorgeous, anyway_.

Then she found that there was one article of clothing on the left hand side of the closet after all. It was in a garment bag, and she peered inside it to see a gorgeous coat that she instantly worshiped. A quick inspection found that it was also worth a pretty penny; the tag, with four digits on it, was still attached to the sleeve. But Sasha frowned; the coat certainly couldn't belong to Pam, as she thought it had. It was too small for the tall blonde, and the sleeves would simply be too short. It looked more in Sasha's size; could it possibly be for her? A present? It seemed like something Eric would arrange. And yet…

Sasha checked the tag again. It looked a little old, and although mothballs and been placed in the pockets, Sasha thought the coat was a little stale from being in the closet. Huh. A mystery, one that bugged her more than she liked.

She spotted something surprising towards the left side of the room—a vanity. A nagging suspicion had been building in her head, and she moved towards it, a funny feeling in her stomach as she did. She paused, her hand on the topmost drawer. She opened it. It was full of make-up, but a quick search revealed that it wasn't much more than very light foundation, concealer—all things vampires had used prior to the Great Revelation to appear more human like. Her shoulders sagged, and she refused to think it was in relief—that was absurd—but for a wild moment, Sasha had wondered if Eric hadn't lived with someone in the apartment—a woman. There were signs here and there—she knew Eric didn't like company in his home, as many vampires of his age would not—but the extra sink, the right side of the closet space, the cabinets in the bathroom, the big kitchen, the mirrored nightstands…it wasn't quite as bachelor-y as she might have expected. When she thought back on it, his apartment in Shreveport only had one nightstand, on his side of the bed.

Sasha's phone rang for the for the _n_ th time that night, and this time she answered it.

" _I don't like being ignored_ ," Eric said with a great deal of annoyance. Sasha rolled her eyes, turning her back on the vanity.

"I got distracted," Sasha told Eric, closing the drawer with a bump of her hip.

She began to retrace her steps. When she passed the locked door, she realized she'd skipped a door just down from it. Opening it, she found another thing that brought a pleased smile to her face: a full laundry, yet another luxury for a city like Manhattan.

" _By_?" Eric asked, his tone suspiciously polite.

 _The sexy but creepy and rude-as-hell driver. My dream. Trying to ignore you_. Sasha thought all these things, but took a more prudent route.

"Your apartment is amazing," she said instead, closing the laundry room. Then she really thought about whom it belonged to, and she tried to picture _Eric Northman_ doing laundry. It didn't quite compute in her brain.

" _You're distracted again_ ," commented Eric. " _Tell me, is Emond there?_ "

Sasha snorted. "Definitely not. I don't think he could get away from me fast enough,"  
" _Good_ ,"

"Excuse me?"

" _I don't want Emond in my apartment,"_ said Eric. " _I don't want anyone there, actually. I don't have to explain why, do I?_ "

"Vampires don't like people in their homes, especially strangers,"

" _That's partly it,_ " said Eric. His tone had shifted to a politely diplomatic one, as though he were about to say something he knew she would not like. " _Of course, you also understand that as my human, you represent me. Naturally, if you were to give the impression that you were…available…it would reflect poorly on me. Anyone who knows of me knows I'm rather—"_

"Controlling? Possessive? Territorial?" asked Sasha bitingly. It wasn't like she planned on sleeping with half the city—she didn't plan on sleeping with _anyone_ —but she was instantly incensed that Eric had the audacity to suggest he could control who she spent time with. He had every right to ask her not to bring people to his apartment, but she didn't miss that he expected her to remain very celibate. Like he had a right to such demands!

"Just because we—" Sasha broke off, fuming as she tried to think of what she wanted to say. She didn't want to bring up the night before—that had been a massive mistake, obviously, and the memory of his lips on her skin were enough to make her shiver. It was tough, regretting such a thing, and she wondered briefly if she was insane. Then she thought that no, she had a perfectly good reason. "Just because last night happened, doesn't mean you can control what I do. Or _who_ ," she added after a moment. It didn't matter that her sexual prospects were forever low; she had a point to make.

Eric was quiet for a moment, so much so that Sasha considered trying to dip into his emotions to sense what he felt.

" _I could care less what did or did not happen last night_ ," said Eric, and Sasha winced. It had been her idea to forget about what had happened after she'd shown Eric her ouroboros tattoo, but it didn't exactly feel good to hear that Eric didn't care. She bit on the inside of her cheek as he went on the slow way he spoke, the loss of his contractions signaled that he was more than just annoyed. He was angry. She had just challenged him, after all. " _You might not be mine in the sense that humans typically belong to my kind, but to the perspective of any outsider: You. Are. Mine._ "

Sasha could think of quite a few woman that would kill to hear those exact words directed at them by Eric—his employee Ginger stood out particularly—but it wasn't so flattering now. It only made her indignant.

The logical side of her understood what Eric was saying; Manhattan wasn't like other vampire territories in the United States. It was the smallest, but also one of the richest thanks to New York City's booming economy. Its queen was very jealous of her territory, and was constantly fending off marriage proposals and attempted takeovers. As a result she guarded what was hers very jealously, and she oversaw her vampires with an iron fist; it was rumored that she had more than vampires at her disposal, a reason why she had been able to remain in power for so long against the larger kingdoms. Eric's claim on her would be respected by any vampire—particularly because she belonged to a sheriff, and infringing upon his claim could be considered an act of war—and it would ensure her safety amongst the vampires.

" _Sasha_?" Eric prompted sharply. She was taking too long to answer him; she rolled her eyes. She could be sure that right about then, Eric was regretting the phone, that he wished he could be there to shake her a bit himself.

"We have a deal," said Sasha finally. "And I intend to respect it. As I have,"

Eric seemed to accept this, and she was content at least that he didn't try to drag the conversation out. " _A notary will be by in the morning, no later than nine to sign the place over to you. It's all been arranged,"_

 _Because you're very good at that,_ thought Sasha. _Arranging things_. She was feeling very spiteful all of a sudden, and though the coat in the closet flashed in her mind, she couldn't bring herself to mention it. After all, she wasn't even so sure it was a gift from him. If it were, she imagined it might have some sort of note attached to it. Perhaps it belonged to a former… _companion_ of his.

Then she thought of the notary, and her spite turned into a little bit of shame. For all of his high-handedness, Eric was putting a considerable amount of trust in her. Before she had left Shreveport, Eric had signed his apartment over to her, ensuring that no vampire but himself and his progeny could enter his apartment under her human ownership. Eric had suggested to Pam she do the same; Sasha could only imagine how she had balked at the idea. Now he was having yet another property of his transferred to her name, and though she appreciated this particular apartment being guarded against vampire entry, it was also a little mystifying that he would go to such lengths. It threatened to create more of that intimacy she was so weary of.

 _I could care less about what did or did not almost happen last night_ he had said. Sasha soured once more, feeling a little like a spurned schoolgirl. Maybe she was the issue here—maybe she was the one that was forging all these ideas of intimacy, and she was overcomplicating something that just wasn't there.

"Yeah, notary, I got it," she said. She'd already heard this before she'd left earlier in the night. Eric had been very thorough about what he expected from her.

And he hadn't even kissed her goodbye.

 _Whoa_ —now where had that come from?

"What else?" she asked briskly. She was eager to be off the phone with Eric, and it was showing.

" _I'll assume, as I suddenly find myself unable to sense your emotions, that you are merely tired, and not being purposefully rude to the vampire that is attempting to insure both your safety and comfort_ ," said Eric.

"Maybe it's the distance," said Sasha. "And yes, I'm tired, but not without appreciation for everything you've done for me, Eric,"

" _Distance,_ " he scoffed, not buying it for a second. He knew she'd dampened their connection. " _How am I supposed to know if you're in danger? If you're hurt? I'm only getting the occasional flash now, and I am at a loss as to what it all means,_ "

"Trust me, if I'm in danger, you'll be the _first_ to know," said Sasha. Eric said something in Swedish, but he changed the subject. She didn't suspect that he was dropping the subject permanently.

" _I've had my day man wire money to your account_ ," said Eric. " _You'll need to do some shopping before you meet with the Queen,_ "

"I have money, Eric,"

" _I am aware. But you are meeting the Queen as my representative, so write it off as an expense of our deal,"_

"Fine,"  
" _Are you worried?_ " Eric asked after another moment. She wondered where he was; if he was in his office at Fangtasia, or if he was at home. Not that it mattered.

"I'm not worried," said Sasha, dropping tiredly onto the grey living room couch. As she'd suspected, it was every bit as comfortable as it looked. "Are you?"

Eric grew quiet on the line for longer than she liked. She suspected he was contemplating answering her question or avoiding it all together. " _You'll be on your own,_ "

"I think I can handle it," she said coolly. "I've been on my own before,"

" _I am not picking a fight with you, Sasha, although you seem intent on it tonight, for whatever reason,_ " said Eric, and more than annoyed, he sounded genuinely angry with her. " _Nor am I doubting your capabilities. But you have never been without a vampire at your side. You had your king, and then you had me. Say what you will, but from the moment we met, no matter my level of trust in you, I shielded you. You are now alone in a foreign city, and for now without allies. Do you understand your situation?_ "

"Well, believe it or not, but I choose not to live my life on the whim of whether or not a vampire is shielding me," said Sasha. "I'll manage,"

He said something in Old Swedish (she thought she could guess at a translation, and she didn't like it) and when he spoke again, it was with a much more controlled tone. That only pissed her off, though, because she didn't like being _handled_ , and that's what he was doing—he was attempting to deescalate, deeming himself as the only reasonable one, like he was the saint for taking the high road.

" _You are many things, Sasha, but vampire is not one of them. I simply ask that you don't let that stunning, sinful mouth of yours forget that. I can assure you that the Queen will say things you don't like, that she'll needle you to get a reaction out of you, and that she'll badmouth me and attempt to seduce you away from me. Keep a cool head, for both our sakes,"_

What he said made sense, which was all the more frustrating for her. Though, she did lock away the part of her _stunning, sinful mouth_ because it was very high praise from a man with centuries of experience. Yet it didn't soften her tone one bit when she answered him.

"And I understand that. I'm going to bed now, so, good night."

" _This whole getting pissy at me for looking out for_ your _safety isn't going to cut it. I hope you wake up with a better fucking attitude in the morning,"_

Then Eric hung up. Sasha was left glaring at the exposed oak beams of the ceiling, cursing the blond vampire.

* * *

"I'm getting real fuckin' sicka you two,"

Eric Northman was barely able to internalize a sigh as he glanced over at his companion on the couch. There was very little that the two vampires would ever see eye-to-eye on, but it was safe to say that both he and Bill Compton thoroughly hated Nan Flanagan **.**

Tonight just wasn't the fucking night for it. His phone call with his witch some two hours previous still weighed heavily on his mind, and she had put him in something of a mood. He hadn't exactly been merry to start with. While Eric wanted to give her some leeway—he was certain that her erratic emotions were tied to her even more erratic magic and that damn tattoo suddenly plastered across her skin—he had a pretty full plate of his own at the moment, and witch PMS wasn't exactly high on his list of priorities. Right now he had to trust that Sasha Buckley would be smart and _not_ get either of them into an inter-kingdom conflict.

"It's a real fuck-fest," Nan went on.

"Excuse me," interrupted Pamela, her drawl extra thick. "But I can assure you that this is nothing like a fuck-fest. Because I enjoy those. This, I did not enjoy. Also, yellow is _not_ your color,"

Even Bill had to look at the ground to compose himself, the need to crack a smile too great. The King stared down at the dark carpet of his office floor until Eric spoke.

"What I'm sure my progeny means to say," cut in Eric when Nan looked like she wanted to fly across the room and rip Pam's arms off. "Is that we're not too sure what the Authority would have preferred,"

"Preferred?" scoffed Nan, eyes flashing dangerously. "The Authority _would have preferred_ you not burn down half the city, sheriff, over a fucking human. The Authority _would have preferred_ you not massacred half of Louisiana's vampire population, including a fellow sheriff. Do I really need to go on?"

"I believe some exaggerations are being made," said Bill. Pam was hardly able to hide her surprise at his defense. "It was hardly over a fourth of the population, and all were vampires that were defying my authority. Those vampires, with Sheriff Catherine Meridian at their forefront, wished to oust me as King and put forth Northman, in the hopes that he would fulfill their vision of laxer laws, the sort that go against the Authority's vision. Was I wrong to protect what is mine?"

"And it wasn't half the city," said Eric with a shrug. "More like half of a warehouse district—an abandoned one at that. I've already started pouring funds into the place to make necessary repairs,"

"And the little human this was all over, as I understand it?" asked Nan. He saw Pam grow still out of his peripheral. Nan ignored her, but her hands curled a little, as though she expected to fend off an attack.

"Gone. She was a little too much trouble," dismissed Eric. "But make no mistake it was never about a human—my actions were those of a sheriff loyal to his oath to his king, and of a vampire far older than all of those present. If I claim something as mine, for however whatever reason, It. Is. Mine. That includes my progeny and anything or anyone I claim as mine. I will not have moronic vampire underlings challenge my claims or authority. So if a fire seems excessive, I won't apologize for making my point. I don't believe I'll have to make it twice,"

"With the point being don't fuck with me?" Nan asked dryly.

"Or my monarch," said Eric, drawing Bill's eyes. Bill Compton didn't exactly give him butterflies in his stomach, but these days he realized it was far smarter to keep the King on his side than against him. Bill wasn't completely stupid; he knew Eric better than Flan did, and he had to know there was more going on with _his human_. But Bill needed him on his side too, so that his reign appeared solid, and Eric's support would help quash any other mentions of rebellion.

Forty-two dead vampires and a fire tended to do that.

Nan's lip curled into a sneer as she came to tower over them.

"You're on thin ice, Viking. You should watch it,"

Eric rose to his full height. For his part, he obeyed the new order that vampires had. But he never forgot that he had known the world for far longer, nor that he was stronger than Nan and most of her Authority flunkies.

"I respect what the Authority is doing," said Eric. "And as I understand it, it's the support of vampires of my age and those older that has ensured the Authority's smooth transition amongst vampires. I promise you that if the Authority does not make a point to continue to favor the old ways—as it had originally agreed—regarding matters of claims and other ancient vampire customs, it will lose that support,"

"Are you threatening me, Northman?" To her credit, Nan Flanagan didn't bat an eyelash. Eric could almost respect her. Almost.

"No. I'm warning you. This little rebellion against Bill proves it; there are vampires that feel that the Authority is subduing their true nature. I sincerely doubt that Louisiana is the only territory this is occurring in,"

"If I hear even one goddamn rumor that there is unrest in this state, I will personally execute you two myself. Is that clear?"

Pam hissed, the hands that had been crossed at her arms dropping, hands curling into dangerous claws.

"All _three_ of you," amended Nan, her eyes on Pam.

But Eric threw up a hand to prevent his progeny from retaliating. "I think you've made your point,"

Nan Flanagan glared at them each in turn, as though to cement her threat. When she was satisfied she had been understood, she straightened the lapels of her jacket.

Pam had been right; yellow was an atrocious color on the vampire.

"Well then, I need to be in dumb-fuck Missouri to make the late night news. I'll see myself out,"

All three vampires waited silently until they were sure that Nan and her entourage had truly left Compton's estate. Naturally, it was Pam that broke the silence, coming around to stand before Eric with her hands on her hips.

"I hate that fucking cunt," she fumed. "I don't know who she thinks she is, threatening _you_ like that, Eric—"

"She's the Authority's puppet. Maybe you shouldn't antagonize her," said Eric calmly. He didn't like Nan, but she was gone now, and that was one less thing to worry about. Eric didn't particularly take her insults or insolence to heart like his progeny did.

"She shouldn't antagonize _me_ , Eric!" exclaimed Pam. "Fuck!" she added, realizing her wig was askew the more aggressive her head movements grew. She reached up and adjusted the blonde wig into place on the crown of her head. "And don't you fucking dare ask… _my King_ ," Pam added flatly when Eric's eyes narrowed in her direction.

Bill glanced between Maker and Child, finally deciding that he didn't care to inquire as to why Pam was wearing a wig. Instead he focused on Eric.

"I'd like a word with you, Eric,"

The use of his first name, as though they were peers and not king and sheriff aroused enough curiosity in the Viking that with a pinch at his bond with his progeny, he sent Pam scowling out the door.

"We have had a version of this conversation already," began Bill. "But we must mean it now more than ever. Louisiana cannot— _you and I_ —cannot afford any mistakes here,"

There was an odd back and forth between them; Bill had gone from naturally subservient—he'd always been so much younger, after all, to Eric's thousand years—to being Eric's lackey by residing in his Area. But now he was Eric's king, and he'd also attempted to assassinate both his progeny and Eric. Eric was certain that Sookie's disappearance wouldn't inspire another attempt on their lives, especially not know that Eric had proven himself an ally. It seemed that Bill was gripped by indecision; in an odd way, their love of Sookie Stackhouse had been what had tied them together, both as rivals and as allies. Without her gone, it was up to them to reevaluate their consideration of the other.

Love; had that been what he'd felt for Sookie? If it had, it was disappointingly dispassionate. Love as he heard it described was something else entirely, and even Sookie Stackhouse didn't drive him to the maddening state Sasha Buckley did now. And he certainly wasn't in love with the witch. Batting thoughts of the women aside, Eric refocused on Bill.

"Agreed," said Eric. But if he was done thinking of them, Bill was not.

"Your…human," said Bill, and his hesitance was all Eric needed to confirm that Bill was indeed suspicious about the circumstances revolving around Sasha. "She is truly gone?"

"She is no longer useful to me here," said Eric.

"And she was your…?"

"Mine," said Eric simply. He did not like Bill's curiosity, and he would only indulge it as much as it benefitted him. Giving Bill the wrong impression would not benefit him; he would not lie if he could avoid it, but he did not want to tell Bill Sasha's whereabouts.

"How did that fire start, Eric?" asked Bill.

Eric moved to a window, peering out to the dark lawn below. He could make out the spot beyond the trees were Sookie Stackhouse had lived. Still lived. Who even knew? He still had hope she lived; he didn't like the idea of her dead.

"I chose Pam in a way that you did not choose Jessica, but—"

"I care about Jessica very much, Eric," said Bill gruffly. Eric glanced over to him. He had no meant to insult Bill.

"Then you can understand that I would move mountains, much less walk through fire for my progeny. I take that bond very seriously; you yourself are very lucky that your attempt on my progeny's life was futile,"

Bill looked away, and Eric through that he might perhaps feel a sense of regret over the whole ordeal.

"I was acting in Sookie's best interest,"

"Why I choose to forgive the incident all together," said Eric with a cold smile. "My oath to you is real. It is, as you said, in our best interest to remain a united front. Now, I know there is work to do, and you will find me willing and able,"

Bill contemplated this for a moment. Then he gave a brisk nod. "You are right. There is much to be done. I have spent the past two nights personally reviewing my staff and selecting replacements for the few that we had to remove. But there is still need for a replacement Sheriff for Area Four,"

"Agreed. You have some names in mind, I presume?"

"A few," said Bill. "But I wish to interview them first. Will you help me?"

An olive branch, if Eric had ever seen one.

"Certainly,"

"You think unrest is brewing elsewhere in the country?" asked Bill, referring to what he had told Nan Flanagan. Eric answered with care; he could not say either way.

"I do believe that if the Authority does not take care in the way that it handles its vampires, there will be unrest, yes. The Great Revelation was to make our time easier by eliminating the threat of exposure. Most vampires enjoy this, however they do not enjoy the restrictions that are still in place that, in some ways, have become far stricter. There is no more self-policing. Now mistreatment of a human, if public enough, could mean a stake for a vampire. How many vampires do you know that agree that a vampire life is on par with a humans?"

"I see," said Bill. He was brooding heavily. "I am confident that you and I can ensure this won't become an issue for Louisiana, Eric,"

"Oh, we must," said Eric. "War might be profitable for the American economy, but a vampire war is certainly not profitable for any of my businesses,"

* * *

"Are you and the Compton done sucking each other off?" Pam asked sourly once he returned to Fangtasia. Eric raised an eyebrow at her as he removed his jacket and placed it on the back of his chair. There was still a long night ahead of him; as he had told Nan Flanagan, he had plans to rebuild the warehouse Sasha had burned down, but rather than spend the money on just fixing the place, he wondered if he couldn't make an actual investment out of it. Fangtasia's books needed looking after, too; since Longshadow, he had not entrusted the job to anyone else. Well, Pam, but she hated bookkeeping. Not to mention that Fangtasia was only one of hundreds of business ventures that he had. For some he was merely a silent partner, others he was more personally invested in, though none currently as much as Fangtasia.

"Bill Compton is no longer our problem, and he won't be as long as I help him regain his footing here in Louisiana. What would you have me do, Pam?"

Pam curled her lip, but she understood how valuable a partnership with the King was to them, given their history. Even Bill Compton was better than another Sophie-Ann.

"And where _is_ the little firestarter? Chained to your bed at home, I hope. Or, just maybe, she's taking her role as lady of the house seriously in a maid's outfit?" asked Pam. She hadn't been at all pleased to hear that Eric had signed his house over to Sasha so readily; actually, she hated the idea. Eric had suggested she do the same with her house, and she had been absolutely livid at the solution.

He hadn't pushed it.

"Or maybe she's deciding what else she can get you to sign over with a bat of her eyelashes. The Porsche? The bar, maybe?"

Eric gave her leeway to bitch and moan and talk to him the way he did knowing she'd nearly died at the hands of the jealous Catherine Meridian. That and, as he'd discovered, his Progeny still harbored a lot of insecurities about her position with him.

"Like I told Compton and Nan Flanagan, Sasha is gone," said Eric.

"What do you mean 'gone'?" asked Pam.

"She left earlier this evening. I thought you'd be pleased,"

But there was no satisfying Pam when it came to the witch, it seemed, because she slammed her fists down on his desk so forcefully he heard splinters crack. She simmered down slightly after he lifted a warning brow.

"She can't be gone, Eric. I'm still bald!" she said, snatching her wig off of her head. Eric chose not to react, knowing that it would further incense her. He had the urge to laugh, but knew that it would not endear his progeny to him. But Pamela had acted terribly in regards to Sasha, and after all the witch had done for her Eric thought that this was the least Pam could suffer through, that it might even be a humbling experience for his childe. After all, it wasn't permanent.

"So that's it, then?" asked Pam.

"It'll grow back, Pam,"

"I'm not talking about the hair, Eric," she said. She stood up straight, folding her arms across her chest. Although her anger had simmered down, she now appeared…frustrated. "You let her go. Just like that,"  
"Just like that," agreed Eric. "I don't think it escaped your notice that she didn't exactly have control over her powers. She wasn't going to learn how to gain it here. Even her grandmother's ghost couldn't teach her that. I wasn't going to force her to stay. It would have ended badly for all of us, sooner or later,"

"But—" Pam broke off, brow furrowing.

"But what?"

"But you didn't want her to go," Pam said carefully. Eric wasn't sure if she chose her words carefully because she feared misspeaking and invoking insult, or because she really wasn't to sure what she wanted to say. "You want her. She…excited you. I'm not blind, Eric. You've been growing bored for years,"

"Yes," conceded Eric. "The nature of my relationship with Sasha Buckley is complex. But it does not matter now, because we'll never know what might have come of it. I'm here, she is not."

Pam pondered that for a while.

"You might not want to hear this, master, but I think it's for the best, having the witch out of your territory. Out of our lives. There are some forces even you can't control, Eric. This might be boring, and fuck it if I'm the one saying it, but at least boring is safe. We could do with some of that these days,"

"You're not wrong," muttered Eric, reaching forward to turn on his computer. He sensed there was more than Pam wanted to say, but she thought better of it now that he seemed so focused on work.

But when the door to his office shut quietly behind his progeny, Eric's façade dropped. He leaned back in his chair, head falling back against it.

What was he doing?

He was allowing Pam to believe that the witch was out of their lives, and though she was out of Louisiana, she was hardly out of his life. His blood was still strong in her, though the witch was shielding her end of the bond as much as she could from him, and he had no intention of letting it fizzle out. Eric wanted to believe that he wasn't telling his progeny the truth to protect her, but Eric didn't think he was withholding the information for anything out of a selfish desire not to hear her bitch and moan.

Because Pam was right; untrained as she was, Sasha was a risk. He should cut her loose, because there was no guarantee that she was an investment that would ever pay off.

Finding that he could not concentrate on work, Eric shut down his computer, annoyed that he could not accomplish the work he had set out to do. He grabbed his car keys, deciding that he needed a drive to curb some of the nervous energy he possessed.

Sasha fucking Buckley.

Pam had a point; having the witch gone should have simplified matters for him. But there was also merit to what he had said: his relationship with her was complex, and the nature of that complexity was foreign to him. They wanted different things, and that should have been enough for him to walk away. They had, after all, settled things. She had told him that she did not want to be a kept human, and had told quite plainly her that he couldn't be the sort of lover she might want. But that had all been before he'd left to squash a rebellion, before she had risked her life for his progeny. Things had changed since then—she had willingly risked her life for what was his, and he had willingly walked through fire for her. If that hadn't been enough, she had quite literally stripped herself bare before him—well, mostly—and revealed the ouroboros tattoo on her body. That had displayed a level of trust in him he did not take for granted.

The night air streamed through the open windows of the Porsche as he drove away from the city and towards the backcountry roads that would permit him to speed freely. But it didn't bring the sort of levity he was looking for, and so he applied more pressure to the gas pedal. Last night. Last night was the fucking problem.

He had no been himself. He had been riding some high—both his progeny and witch were safe, and his enemies had met a painful death. Sasha had risen in his estimation in a way he had not thought possible: even scared of her own power, Sasha had displayed a strength that he admired. Eric had been so intoxicated by her that he had recklessly offered to turn her. He did not regret doing so, for he meant it; Sasha would make an excellent maker, and in his eyes she had more than earned the right. But he knew that the timing had been all wrong; he had been swept away by some strange excitement—had he come across as insincere to her? Tactless, for offering her death for life, when she'd nearly died? Or had he come across as a desperate vampire wanting to absolve himself of any debt? And then there had been that dinner—an utter disaster.

Something ached fiercely in his fangs, and Eric was forced to reconcile with an emotion that took several miles to identify. Embarrassment—imagine that, Eric Northman, Embarrassed! But that was what he felt, when he thought of the way that he had acted. Yes, intoxicated was the only way to describe his behavior of the previous night.

When Sasha had returned to his apartment, Eric had had a beautiful dinner planned for her. He had given her his entire focus, something he thought would please her, feeling that she deserved some reward—she had, after all, made no sign of wanting to accept being turned. Privately he was pleased. But something in Eric had gotten away from him last night, after she'd shown him that ouroboros tattoo. Spurred on by the trust she showed in him—did she regret it now? He thought she might—and the combination of her heady scent, his admiration of her, and the general inexplicable lightness he'd felt, he hadn't acted wisely. Perhaps it was because after she told him she would leave Louisiana the following day, they had both felt it was something of a goodbye.

Eric had bedded her, but not at all in the sense he had initially set out to achieve. After their dinner, after the ouroboros tattoo revelation, he'd swept her into bed, where they'd talked. Talked about everything from their pasts—they had kept it light, neither eager to dwell on pain or trauma, given the recent events—but they'd learned a lot about the other, and Eric had even ventured a question or too asking how she'd found Pam, how she'd managed to rope in Alcide Herveaux in her little suicide mission. They'd talked—and they'd kissed, so, so much. They'd laughed too, and even Eric understood that the way that he had treated her was tenderly. She had accepted his every kiss, though she stopped him often, cheeks glowing when she admitted that he was testing her control over her magic. The fear of fire should have kept him at bay; it did not. He spoke to her to calm her down and, when they both felt the danger had passed, he'd kissed her twice as hard, with twice as much longing.

Eric's head hit back against the Porsche's headrest, fingers gripping almost maddeningly around the steering wheel. He had treated her like a lover—worse, like a friend. Like everything he had repeatedly told her he would not be to her. No wonder the girl had taken off at the first chance, why she was so distant from him now. She was hundreds of miles away now, and she was dampening the bond between them at every chance, and he had failed to understand why until now. Witch or not, raised by vampires or not, she thought of intimacy in relation to human mortality. She feared growing too close to him. He supposed that the best thing for all parties involved was that they honored the distance between them. Carnal desires aside, it was futile to entertain the idea of there being anything beyond a partnership between a witch and a vampire.

He saw the sense in that, the practicality. So he would honor that. He would wipe away his desire for Sasha Buckley.


	3. Chapter 2

**Yet another apology for my lack of updates; my personal life has taken an unexpected turn, and unfortunately the few opportunities i had to write fanfiction didn't result in much; my lack of enthusiasm drove my muse away on vacation, and she's only recently returned. i'm hopeful she'll be a lot less flighty from now on.**

 **Please help keep me motivated with reviews! They're like accountability to me lol.**

* * *

 **Chapter 2: Queen Ambition**

The sun was shining, the morning was warmer than had been predicted, and Sasha Buckley was in an awful mood. The day before she'd fallen asleep with the hope that the torrent of the day's emotions would settle into serenity overnight. Unfortunately for her, the only thing that had settled was a narrow worldview, a bitter taste in her mouth, and the desire to see no one.

But, as had been promised, her nine o'clock appointment was right on time.

Another perk of her new building was the three conference rooms available for use to tenants. They could be signed out to the building's tenants, for everything from birthday parties to the occasional tenant meeting or, for cases like hers: meetings with lawyers. And so dressed and washed up, Sasha rode the elevator down to Conference Room Three, which Eric had booked for her, and found Brett Evergreen waiting for her.

He was younger than she expected, probably in his mid thirties, with a headful of fine blonde hair and bright green eyes. Brett Evergreen was tall and lean, with something of a loveliness about him that immediately brought a smile to her face despite her lack of willingness to even tilt the corners of her mouth up.

He was not, Sasha expected as consequence, entirely human.

"Good morning. You must be Sasha Buckley," greeted Brett, shaking her hand. His skin was soft and warm like sunshine. "Brett Evergreen, but please call me Brett,"

"Pleasure to meet you, Brett."

Sasha took a seat when he offered the one across from her. Though there was nothing particularly ostentatious about the room, the black walnut table was handsome and sat up to twelve, the leatherback chairs were comfortable, and the window lined walls remained private enough. Already Brett had made himself comfortable, having arranged a series of documents on the table for their perusal. Mostly, Sasha was delighted to find that he'd brought coffee and a couple pastries.

"Please, help yourself," said Brett, noticing that she was eyeing the food longingly. "Mr. Northman was very specific about your preferences,"

Sasha lifted an eyebrow, cup of coffee halfway to her mouth. If Brett was angry that his client had also decided to use his lawyer as a delivery boy, he did not show it. And when she took a sip of the coffee, she was a little annoyed to find that not only was Mr. Northman specific about her preferences, he was also accurate. Sasha used to take her coffee black; but that had been before she'd ingested so much vampire blood. A side effect of vampire blood consumption was a craving for sugar. Now she took her coffee with a teaspoon of brown sugar and the smallest hint of milk.

 _I hate him_ , thought Sasha. It was impossible to tell if the gesture was meant to placate her, or if Eric was simply sending her a subtle reminder that he was her overseer in all things, big and small.

"Would you like to take a moment to eat, or would you like to begin?" asked Brett.

"You're paid by the hour, right?" asked Sasha. "And a lot, I'd imagine. I think I'll take my time and just have my breakfast, if it's all the same to you,"

Brett, with a small smile, told her he did not mind waiting.

In the end, it was all over within the hour. It only took so long because Brett, fine and fair lawyer that he was, insisted on her rereading the entire contract, though there were no hidden stipulations, no odd clauses. Sasha had half-expected to find, somewhere in very fine print, a clause that stated that Sasha would pay Eric rent in blood, or something similarly unsavory. But there were no such addendums, and soon she was she was the very proud owner of an Upper East Side apartment. It was, above all, suspicious that Eric Northman had not tried to extort her for more.

"I believe that is all. Enjoy your stay in the City, Miss Buckley. And please, if you have any troubles at all, you have my number," said Brett, tapping the business card he'd placed on the table. "I'm well versed in human law obviously, but my expertise extends far past the mundane law,"

"Thank you," said Sasha. "I'll keep that in mind,"

"Excellent. I officiate, too," he added as he stood up.

Sasha glanced at the document in her hands—the contract that stated the apartment was now hers.

"This isn't—thank you," said Sasha, smiling broadly. She wasn't about to explain that this apartment wasn't some gift born out of a love connection between herself and Eric Northman, but the lawyer didn't need to know, supe or not. So she smiled, thanked him again, and then gathered her things and returned upstairs to the apartment. She did have another laugh on her way up.

Her? Married to _Eric_? Married in general? Ha!

The contract was mostly the same as the one Eric had drawn up for them in Shreveport. The difference there had been one single stipulation: the Shreveport contract lasted a year. The Manhattan contract was indefinite.

With the change of ownership, Sasha felt more at ease in the apartment. She didn't expect a vampire to try to force their way in at night, but the precaution couldn't hurt and, as soon as she was capable, Sasha would place wards on the apartment that would protect her from any other kind of intruder.

Dressing for the day, Sasha made a list for the day. She had a lot of errands to run; she hadn't left Shreveport with much, and the fire that she'd accidentally started when she had been renting Sam Merlotte's house had destroyed most of the few possessions she had brought from California. The things she had now she had been fortunate enough to leave behind in the car, and the others Eric had supplied for her. Now that she would be spending the foreseeable future in Manhattan, she was eager to make a small space feel her own.

A quick trip around the house, mostly through the kitchen, revealed what she needed to be on the look out for during her preliminary excursion. It wasn't much; the kitchen was surprisingly well stocked. In the cupboards she found a set of pale blue ceramic dishes and bowls. In another she founds cups, wine glasses, cocktail glasses, and even a couple of mugs. The drawers were stocked with silverware and kitchen utensils, and the bottom cupboards with every pam imaginable. As she had the day before, Sasha noted it as odd for a vampire's home, and once again it crossed her mind that Eric might have had a very close and very human friend stay over frequently during his sojourn in New York. Who ever he or she was, he had never mentioned, and it really wasn't any of her business, so she pushed it out of her mind.

By late morning, Sasha was ready to tackle a major portion of her to-do list. She paused only to take a moment to make sure she was shielded her magical aura as her grandmother had taught her, then she set out to explore her new city.

* * *

Nikolas Weber tugged at the collar of his turtleneck sweater, peering up at the Manhattan sky. Though not unwelcome respite from the downpour that had assaulted the city all week, even he was at a loss for the spike in the weather. Overnight, it had become unseasonably warm for a New York November, and he wondered if he perhaps should not be investigating that particular phenomenon, rather than some newcomer witch. Certainly it was something supernatural, and it was common for a few daring witches to try to mess with the weather. But Emmett had given his orders, and Nikolas intended on following them.

He always did.

Lighting another cigarette, Nikolas continued observing the building across the street. He was ignored by those on the sidewalk; the tourists and city folk that looked at him too closely soon had their attention diverted by a gentle nudge from his glamour.

The building in question was ridiculously nice. It was prime real estate even for the Upper East Side; the white stone façade had an excellent view of the Park across the street, and was dotted with more than one enviable balcony. Typically, he was averse to such neighborhoods, but his tracking had led him here, and even he was unable to ignore the beauty of the place.

That morning, it was also a very sleepy building. Very early in the morning, an elderly woman accompanied by a younger gentleman left the building, engulfed in a massive fur coat and guarded by two large Dobermans. Then, later, a man in his mid-thirties arrived. The blond had caught Nikolas's attention; there was the spark of something Other about him, though it was faint enough, and he wondered if he was a tenant or simply visiting. The man emerged not too longer after, an hour or so later than he had arrived.

Finally, the witch he'd been tasked with tailing stepped foot outside. Her skin was the color of milky coffee. She was of average height. Her hair was very curly, catching the light and displaying a multitude of hues in it's half up half down do. She was a pretty girl, Nikolas thought, and like the man, had the barest hint of something Other about her, but nothing remarkable.

Nikolas watched as she fiddled with a cell phone for a minute then took off down the street. He followed.

He could guess that it was her first time in the neighborhood, at the very least, if not the city. She checked her phone regularly, often before crossing a street or making a turn. She seemed interested with her new surroundings, often pausing to admire buildings and shops or to take a picture or two, perhaps noting their location. She was interested, but not overwhelmed, not like he had been when he had first arrived in New York City. Then again, he'd barely been sixteen at the time and had only ever spent his life in his tiny German village. Back then, he had never even visited the large German cities; how life had been so different, then.

Nikolas followed the young witch all morning. She did nothing remarkable—not unless he counted her voracious spending. The girl had a modest breakfast, then set upon several department stores, the likes of which made him balk. She shopped and shopped, dropping the address of the building that he had sat outside all morning as a delivery address. He noted that she seemed interested in formal wear, and she spent a long time trying dresses and suits and skirts, much to the glowing pleasure of the woman assisting her. There had been only a brief moment of contention—an older woman who worked in sales had turned her nose up, not believing that the girl had the means to pay for the items she seemed so interested in. But the young witch had simply called up another, younger sales woman, and the woman had smartly not made the same mistake.

Overall, Nikolas couldn't detect a trace of magic being used.

After her shopping spree, she had a light lunch, and by then Nikolas was well and truly bored. He could not understand why it was so important he tail this new witch in their territory—she was now purchasing household cleaning supplies, for the love of all the gods in high heaven—but he persevered. He would not fail Emmett, not after all the warlock had done for him.

Sasha was well and truly shopped out. But she was glowing from the pleasure of it, and by the time she arrived home in the late afternoon, Sasha found that all of her things had been delivered to the apartment. She spent some time sorting through it all—she'd gone just a _little_ overboard—and worked on putting away a few groceries in the kitchen and then all of her new clothes in the closet.

When she was done, Sasha showered. She had a very big evening ahead of her, and by the time she stepped foot out of the shower, she was almost trembling with nerves. She was both terrified and terribly excited: tonight she would be meeting with the Vampire Queen of Manhattan, and there was no telling how it would go.

Sasha stared at her naked body in the mirror's reflection. She had scrubbed her skin until it was faintly pink, had combed and brushed through her curls until they were shiny and bouncy, and had shaved and moisturized and plucked and preened thoroughly. Tonight she would be representing both herself and Eric Northman, and as his human, she would have to play the part to the best of her ability.

After spending one more moment on her eyebrows—there was just that _one_ hair that seemed to throw off the symmetry between them—Sasha dried herself off and did her hair and make up. With the help of some hair gel, hairspray, and a wickedly strong brush, she tamed her curls back into a sleek, high ponytail with a waterfall of curls. Next she brushed on some make up—mostly eye make up, because thanks to Eric's blood, she had never had clearer skin. She highlighted her cheeks with a little blush and a little bronzer and glossed her lips. It was just as she grew satisfied that her eyelashes were thick, dark, and curly that her phone went off.

It was none other than the devil himself.

 _What are you wearing?_ -EN

Sasha cocked at eyebrow as she stared down at the text. After their conversation last night, it seemed odd that Eric was hitting her up with a flirtatious text. It wasn't like he could know that she was still standing naked in his bathroom—right?—but the timing was odd.

Assuming he meant for her meeting with the Queen, Sasha shot him back a description of her outfit.

Black jumpsuit, lilac coat, emerald heels and a matching purse. –SB

Send me a picture. –EN

Sasha rolled her eyes, tossing the phone onto the bed as she entered the bedroom. The bed had been extremely comfortable, but also a constant reminder of how lonely she was, swallowed up by its staggering size as she had been. She tried not to think about that, and dressed instead.

Sasha stepped into her jumpsuit. It was a gorgeous Dior number with wide legs, a boned bodice with a triangle cutout under her breasts. It boasted a sweetheart neckline and was strapless, exposing her collarbones and neck, displaying the sort of assets that vampires were especially drawn to for. Her shoes were high heeled, pointed toe emerald green Jimmy Choo pumps and her little clutch glittered under the light caught in its Swarovski-studded design. Her coat was a Chanel, fine Italian wool dyed a sweet lilac color, a color that Sasha felt worked well for her and softened the aggressive sex appeal of the jumpsuit. She did, after all, want to make it back home in one piece.

After positioning the coat over her shoulders, then took a picture of herself in the floor length mirror in the closet. She sent it to Eric, then placed her phone in her coat pocket.

 _You're an actual idiot_ , Sasha thought to herself when she was dismayed to find Luca Emond waiting for her in the lobby. She should have known that the person Eric had hired to drive her to the Queen's would the very same man that had picked her up at the airport. Luca Emond didn't look anymore pleased to see her, even if he did spare her a cursory up and down glance. Maybe he just wasn't impressed enough by what he saw. She was admittedly a little miffed. Vampires, at least on the overall, tended to find her charming.

"Let's go," he said stiffly, holding the car door open for her. It was a different car than before; this one was far nicer, a black Lincoln with leather interiors and all the trimmings. Even Luca had changed; his jeans were gone, and now he wore a black suite. He was annoyingly hot.

Sasha paused before stepping into the car.

"I'm not too sure what I did to offend you, but if you agree I'd like to start over," she said in her most diplomatic tone. She didn't have to like the guy, but if she really was stuck with him for the foreseeable future, Sasha did think t best to at least attempt to reconcile their differences…whatever the may be.

"Look, I don't know who or what you are, but you make my skin crawl. I'm just counting down the seconds until this job is done, all right?"

She took more offense to that than she cared too, and so she ducked mutely into the car, tears of frustration threatening to sting her eyes. Sasha couldn't say why it affected her so much, only that she couldn't understand such malice being directed at her from someone that was a total stranger to her—what the hell had she ever done to him? Whatever aura he exuded—well it wasn't exactly rainbows and butterflies either.

Luca Emond stood outside of the car for a moment too long, then finally settled into the driver's seat. His shoulders were very tense, and she had the impression that he was actively refusing to look at her even by accidentally seeing her in the reflection of the car's mirrors and shiny interiors. That was all too fine by her.

Looking to appear busy and unaffected—the opposite of what she was in that moment—Sasha reached once more for her phone. Eric had responded to her picture text and, although she was firmly on her Distance From Eric plan, she flushed with pleasure at his response **.**

 _I will be the envy of many. –EN_

Answering him would lead to dangerous territory, and so Sasha tucked her phone back into her pocket. At least someone wasn't repulsed by her.

* * *

The Queen of Manhattan owned a stunning block in Greenwich Village. Although the sun had set, even as they pulled up to the street, Sasha could spot a dozen vampires, dressed to blend in, acting as security. One of these, a hip-looking female tourist with a camera, casually walked over to Luca's window, acting as though she were asking for directions.

"I don't have you on any list for the night, Emond," said the woman without preamble. "You know if you want an audience with the Queen—"

"Yeah, I know, I know sweetheart," Luca grinned, and Sasha nearly jumped out of her skin as she caught sight of the breathtaking smile he flashed the redhead's way. The vampire's lips twitched upwards into a sultry smirk.

"Could it be you just wanted to see me?" she flirted.

"Well Rita, it's certainly always a pleasure," purred Luca. "But she's the one with an appointment, not me,"

Sasha could have scoffed at the thumb being jammed back carelessly in her direction, but a moment later her window was being rolled down, and the female vampire came over to inspect her. She was a short redhead with pin straight chin length hair and blue eyes. Her skin was so pale she glowed in the night.

 _I guess I'm just not his type_ , thought Sasha dryly.

"And you are?" the vampire, Rita, asked not impolitely.

"Sasha Buckley," said Sasha, offering up one of her own dazzling smiles. "I have an audience with your Queen on behalf of Eric Northman,"

"Sasha Buckley, on behalf of Eric Northman," repeated Rita, her head cocking to the side minutely. Sasha spotted the earpiece nestled beneath locks of red hair. "Yeah all right. Go on through,"

She moved them away and signaled to someone across the street, and Luca pulled the car right onto the sidewalk. Sasha started, only to realize that what she was looking at wasn't quite real. She blinked away the image a magical ward offered her, choosing instead to see beyond the façade and to the reality. The sidewalk had a driveway in the middle of it, and Luca was slowly crawling them through the under passage of the building, to the courtyard that led beyond. Sasha watched in fascination, realizing that the Queen's mansion had more than just vampire security. It had magic.

Luca pulled over in the center of the courtyard, coming around to open Sasha's door for her, though it seemed to pain him just to look at her. Sasha ignored him, far more interested with her surroundings. The buildings were beautiful, built of light stone and topped with dark blue roofs, lined by glass intricately designed glass windows. It looked to be about seven stories tall, wrapping around the spacious courtyard, offering a haven from the calamity of the busy street beyond. Not a single human walking by would ever know what magnificent stood mere feet away.

A young man that couldn't be much older than Sasha and wearing a light blue uniform came out to take the car keys from Luca, telling him he would park it until they needed it again. This surprised Sasha, because she didn't think Luca was coming in with her, but it appeared that Eric was paying him to be more than just a chauffeur. Again, she wondered what he was. He had to be something; after all, he had asked, no accused her of being something herself.

The tall doors that led into the mansion opened up, and Sasha's easy smile dropped along with her jaw. She recognized the vampire that stepped out instantly.

"Marius?!"

* * *

" _Sie scherzen. Shieße_!"

Oh shit, indeed. The unlit cigarette Nikolas had in his mouth tumbled into his lap as he realized what street they were turning onto. He quickly told the cab driver to pull over, thrusting the appropriate bills into the man's hands. He was out the door and onto the street in the next second, his eyes still on the black Lincoln as it turned onto the street that supes all over the city had renamed Queen's Way.

Muttering more curses in German, Nikolas followed after the car, shedding the wards that protected him from human eyes as he went. He heard a gasp as he practically appeared out of nowhere to an elderly woman, but he ignored it, his long legs carrying him towards his destination. It was crawling with vampires, and it would take more energy that he could or would expend to hide himself entirely from their keen senses. Going in with his wards and glamours would simply alert them that there was a witch in the area that didn't want to be detected, and no one would care who he was following: skulking around the Queen's palace for whatever reason would incite the sort of trouble no witch wanted. Emmett would be furious.

Nikolas stopped across the street from the block of buildings he knew to be the Vampire Queen's palace, ducking into a glass-fronted Laundromat so that he could observe the building and not look too suspicious. The wards that his kind had put in place had little affect on him since he knew what to look for, and he watched as a redheaded vampire spoke first with Luca Emond, then with the witch he was tailing.

Luca fucking Emond.

He hadn't found Sasha Buckley threatening or even suspicious until he saw the company she kept. But the second he'd seen her step into his car, he was sold. This Sasha Buckley girl was Bad News. _And_ she consorted with vampires?

Nikolas ducked behind the wall when he sensed eyes coming his way. Luca's keen eyes were glancing his way. But the next moment he was pulling into the Queen's palace. Nikolas wasn't sure if he had been made or not, but it wouldn't surprise him. The man had the senses of a fucking hellhound.

His eyes still across the street, Nikolas opened his phone, dialing the first number on his speed dial.

"Evenin'"

"The witch you had me track—her name is Sasha Buckley," Nikolas said hurriedly, skipping the usual pleasantries. "She's with that fiend Luca Emond. They're visiting at Queen's Way, Emmett."

"Well shit," was the unexpectedly candid response. "All right. Good work. Get some rest. Don't worry about the witch any longer,"

"But Emond—"

"I'll handle it," Emmett said smoothly. "But can I trust you to walk away? Right now? Luca Emond is not worth the trouble crossing the vampires will cause,"

Nikolas cursed. "Only because it is you asking, Emmett."

He hung up.

* * *

Sasha had been so preoccupied with how she'd be representing Eric and the vampires of Louisiana that she hadn't even considered the vampires she'd known from before. But now one of them was standing before her, looking every bit as surprised to see her as she did him.

"Marius?!"

"Sasha?" he asked, equally thrown.

As put-together as ever, Marius was a vampire that had experienced his human death in his late forties. He had a headful of dark hair neatly combed back and sad grey eyes. A French accent was mixed in with the permanent contempt he seemed to have for the world and everything in it.

She'd always liked Marius or at least, she'd always been very fascinated by him. He was very bitter, very pessimistic, and yet he had always been dependable and loyal to Malachi. It had always been obvious to her that he did not approve of her presence at the compound, but Malachi had decreed it so, and he had kept other vampires in line when the situation called for it when it came to her. He had grown tired of California a few years ago and left to wander the US. She hadn't realized he'd wandered all the way here.

"Are things well in—"

"Louisiana has been treating me fine, thank you," Sasha said with a serene smile. She could feel Emond's curious gaze boring into the back of her head. He was no fool; he knew something was up. "I'm here at the behest of one of her Sheriffs,"

"Louisiana," Marius repeated slowly. "I've heard there's been such…excitement in those parts,"

Marius hated excitement, of course.

Marius stepped forward, hands clasped behind his back as his eyes observed Emond unabashedly. "And does your family know the company that you keep?" he asked.

Sasha wasn't sure if that was a warning or an offer; if he thought she was betraying her nest or if he was offering to notify them of her location on her behalf. She simply smiled in any case.

"I'm a big girl. A little excitement is doing me good. Keeps me from getting too spoiled—silver spoons are hazardous for more than just vampires," Here he scoffed. Politely, she asked, "Are you a part of the Manhattan nest, or just passing through?"

"A very unofficial part. A guest, really," said Marius. His usually somber expression looked a little less dismal as he did the same math she did. If she was here on the behalf of a Sheriff, even a foreign one, Sasha should have been greeted by an official member of the Queen's court out of deference to Eric. But by sending Marius, the Queen was purposefully insulting Eric. They were off to a great start.

"Well," said Sasha. "This should be fun for me, then,"

"Whatever troubles you have are your own, Sasha Buckley," he warned her. Then he made a sweeping gesture to the door. "Do come in, then."

The inside of the palace was reminiscent of Châteaux Versailles, and despite the fact that it was evening, the interior shone brightly. Lamps in the walls and chandeliers in the ceilings kept every hallway and every room lit so that every visitor was sure not to miss any of the palace's opulence.

And what opulence it was. Sasha's historical background had always geared towards events and people rather than art, but she recognized several works hanging on the walls, and those that were unfamiliar to her were easily identifiable by their characteristics. She wished she could have spent more time admiring the art when it crossed her mind that if this was just the entrance, just what the hell kind of priceless pieces lay at the center of the Queen's mansion? Imaginable.

Sasha knew that the Queen was rich; in the vampire world, this was a well-known fact. The details of her vast riches were unclear, and it was assumed that her wealth was a combination of her prosperous territory and her own personal wealth acquired over all the centuries she had lived. Just how many centuries that was….well, that was also unclear. There were rumors that she was a thousand year old or two thousand. There were quieter, more hastily whispered rumors, of an ancient Egyptian deity that had been cast out of the heavens and punished with mortality. That goddess-turned woman had then been turned by one of the first vampires.

As unfathomable as Eric's one thousand odd years were to her, she did not think that this Queen had lived five times that. Rumors were just rumors, and rumors like that had only bolstered the Queen's reputation.

Sasha lost track of just where they were in the building. She just knew that Luca Emond was at her back, and she couldn't be sure if that was more comforting or discomforting. Marius had established that he wanted to be left out of her matters, and although she knew that he would not come to her aid, she also assumed that he had decided to keep how they knew each other to himself. At least for now.

They had to wait, of course. Marius escorted them to the last door in a long hallway, leaving them with a set of two of the burliest vampires Sasha had ever seen. They were dark-skinned, with skin so dark it appeared the sort of blue-black of the ocean beneath the light of the moon. They held spears longer than she was tall, with thick silver tips at their end.

She was stunned by them; they were larger than life, exceedingly beautiful and, standing shirtless as they did, it took a moment for Sasha to notice that neither had eyes in their sockets. Her own eyes blew wide open in shock. Even Emond stiffened behind her.

She had never seen more formidable vampires.

Holy hell.

"When the Queen is ready, they will let you through," said Marius. She had the impression that the two vampires—brothers, she was willing to guess—creeped the fuck out of even him.

Left alone in that hallway, with only the silent, unseeing vampire guards (she had her doubts that 'unseeing' properly described them), Sasha glanced at Luca Emond. He was staring unabashedly at the vampire guards, and she wondered what he was thinking; he seemed familiar with the Queen's outside guard, yet his shock suggested that he had never seen these two before. Were they a recent gain to the Queen's guard?

When they were finally called in nearly forty minutes later, Sasha's eyes were immediately glued to the mysterious Queen of Manhattan.

She was breathtakingly lovely. No taller than Sasha, her petit frame was enviably curvy. Sasha knew this because the Queen had risen from her spot behind her large desk and was swaying her way, moving with a grace so unnatural it was starting to frighten Sasha. She went to step back, wanted to look back at Luca, but found that her instincts didn't want to let her look away from the creature so obviously a predator.

A predator that was stalking her.

She was a snake, a deadly viper—so stunning, so sultry in her movements was the Queen. Her deep black hair rippled with her every step, and her amber eyes glowed with how light they were. She stood so close that if Sasha pursed her lips, she would kiss the Queen. It was hard to place the queen's origins by simply looking at her. She could have been Middle Eastern just as easily as she could have been Indian; perhaps she was a mixture of both.

The Queen spoke first.

"Well how about that," she said. Her accent was so faint it was hard to place. Or, as might have been likely, simply one Sasha couldn't place in the modern world.

"Your Majesty," said Sasha, moving to bow. But the Queen caught her under the chin by her finger, preventing her movement. She was left to stare into the amber eyes of Queen Salma without losing her nerve.

"How funny," said the Queen, turning Sasha around. They both faced a large mirror hung on the wall.

"We even look alike, if just a little," said the Queen, her radiant amusement leaving Sasha lost. She tried to compare their faces objectively but came up with nothing. The Queen's skin was darker than hers. Sasha's mouth was wider, fuller. The Queen's nose was larger but narrower than Sasha's. They both had high, plump cheekbones, but calling them similar was reaching. "Maybe that's why Northman chose you," she continued pleasantly. "He always was so desperate for my attentions,"

Sasha's first response was instant fury. How _dare_ Eric Northman keep to himself that he'd had some sort of romantic passed with her! He'd let her walk into a difficult enough situation without arming her to the best of his ability!

Then she remembered his words of warning.

 _…The Queen will say things you don't like, she'll needle you to get a reaction out of you, and that she'll badmouth me and attempt to seduce you away from me._

Eric's words echoed strongly in her head, tempering her shock and surprise at her words. The Queen was playing her games; had been since before she'd even stepped foot into her study. So Sasha did what she grew up doing. She put on a mask and played along.

 _Now entering, Player 2_ , she thought.

"You honor me with such a comparison, your Majesty," said Sasha. The Queen was testing the waters of her bond with Eric; trying to make her jealous or insecure.

Let her try.

"I am by no means the sort of regent that must be so constantly reminded of her title," said the Queen. "You may call me my by current name. Salma,"

The Queen finally released her, and Sasha now had time to observe what she wore. It was a wine-red suit. A seam of satin ran down the sides of the pants. She didn't seem to wear anything beneath the fitted jacket. If the Queen hadn't been bluffing, Sasha wouldn't have been surprised if Eric had lusted after her.

The Queen was a major fox; too mad she was such a bitch.

Sasha remained quiet, waiting for the Queen to engage her first. She was almost certain that the Queen's laser-focus gaze and already memorized her face and anything that was of consequence to her. If anything, the vampire was simply trying to get her to grow uncomfortable, to squirm under her scrutiny, or to lose patience. But this was a practiced game for Sasha, and so she remained in place, letting her try to glean anything she could. After all, she wasn't the only one studying her opponent.

"Very well," said Salma with a flourish of her hand. "Speak your piece,"

The Queen had something against her, Sasha soon gathered. It was there in the way she looked at Sasha, with ill-repressed contempt. The more they spoke, the more obvious the Queen's contempt grew. For the life of her Sasha could not understand why; she had never met Queen Salma before, nor had she been involved with any dealings in her territory until now. She'd followed the Queen's procedure by appearing before her and requesting her permission to stay in her city. Could this be about Eric? It seemed a ridiculous notion. This wasn't some unhinged vampire, not like Catherine Meridian, the former Sheriff of Area Four had been. Even if Salma held some sort of attachment or attraction to Eric, she was a _Queen. The_ Queen. She would not be threatened by Sasha. Most of all, Sasha refused to believe that Eric, however captivating and beautiful and alluring as he was, that he was so charming that he was capable of reducing women—particularly powerful vampire queens—into jealous, vindictive school girls. She simply refused. Catherine Meridian had to be a one off.

Unsurprisingly, the Queen didn't even flinch when Sasha mentioned that she was a witch. Either she could tell—if she was truly so old, it wasn't unfathomable—or perhaps Eric had already told her. She definitely wasn't impressed by her, and she was quick to reveal to Sasha that the Manhattan Coven was at capacity already.

That interested her greatly; it showed a relationship between the coven and the Queen, only who knew how imbalanced or balanced it was?

"I understand your concerns about coven sizes—"

"Do you?" The Queen asked coldly.

Sasha locked eyes with the monarch, refusing to be appear weak or castigated when she had no reason to.

"I can begin to," Sasha said firmly. "You reign over the smallest North American territory, yet one of the most profitable. Everyone wants what you have, and many might have taken it from you if you weren't so shrewd about the company you keep," It was a long established rumor that Queen Salma's forces included more than just vampires. The magic at her gates confirmed this. "Your advantage relies on the loyalty of the supes in your city, but allowing them to amass could prove counterproductive. I understand _that_ ,"

"How clever you are,"

She said this most unhappily.

By now, Sasha was starting to lose some of her patience, even as she refused to let it show. She could deal with vampires looking down at her because of what she was—whether it was because they assumed she was human, or in the case of the Queen or even Eric's progeny Pam, because witches were troublesome tools and nothing more. But this was some something else all together—this was _personal_. Yet, and as perplexing as the notion was, Salma had something personal against her. What could that possibly be? How could Sasha even begin to broach the subject without sounding like she was accusing the Queen?

"And if I were to swear by blood that I would not join the Manhattan Coven, would there be some fee or fine I could pay to reside here, at least until my business is concluded?" proposed Sasha. During the course of the hour, the Queen hadn't outright said that she wouldn't grant Sasha permission to remain in the city. If anything, she had repeatedly used the same wording and phrases, as if circumventing outright denying her.

Like she was waiting for Sasha to give up and leave. But if that's what she truly wanted, why didn't she simply order her out of her sight?

The Queen blinked. Her eyes turned even colder. "Your stay is granted on a prior promise. The price has been paid, therefore I cannot go back on my word,"

 _Wait, what?_

"If you do not break my law, do not work against me, you are guaranteed a year since the day you arrived in my territory. Any further time will be at my discretion and pleasure," went on the Queen. "No vampire shall harm you, and _Eric Northman's_ claim on you shall be recognized,"

"Please, Your Majesty," said Sasha. That had been far too easy; she was missing something. "What promise? Who paid this fine?"

The Queen's mouth twisted unpleasantly. "Your gracious benefactor. I gave given you more than enough of my time, little witch. Leave me,"

The abrupt and ungracious dismissal caused her back to stiffen, but she bowed respectfully all the same to the Queen and stepped out of the study. The weight of the blind guards' attention followed her all the way down to the end of the hallway where Luca Emond was waiting for her.

"Done?" Luca asked.

"Let's get the hell out of here," said Sasha.

It was as they were waiting for the car to be brought back around that Luca asked.

"So you and Northman are what to each other, exactly?"

"Mostly, we're none of your business," Sasha said sharply. He'd been a jerk since they'd met, and she didn't like his sudden interest.

"You are his?" asked Luca. When she said nothing, he repeated, "You _are_ his," only this time it was not longer a question.

"What, because you're interested?" she asked skeptically. "Yes, I'm his,"

"Now I am," murmured Luca.

He even opened the door for her without a trace of animosity.

* * *

"How long?" Pam demanded as she leaned against his dresser. She had invited herself over saying she would help him pack, but so far she hadn't done much more than lounge about in her petulance and criticize his choices in denim.

That and show off her new wig. She'd decided that if she had to wear the damned things for the time being, she'd have some fun. Tonight her hair was bubblegum pink.

"Why, you'll miss me?" Eric asked sardonically. It wasn't that Pam would take any particular enjoyment from being away from him—they had never had that type of Maker-Progeny relationship, thankfully. But the concept of missing something, much less someone wasn't very common for vampires. To miss people, friends and family from the human life was a weakness and sure to drive a vampire mad. And with such a long life, even makers that got along well with their progenies found it difficult to miss each other, no matter how much they enjoyed each other's company; time stretched differently for them, and there was never a fear of wasting or losing time together. There was always another night, another decade, another century. Even Eric hadn't missed Godric until his maker had met the sun. Even when they nested, vampires were too solitary for the concept of _missing someone_.

"Hardly. Some time apart will do us good. Neither of us are used to it anymore, and although I'm glad we were together while this shit storm blew through town, I think it's good you're going away,"

Eric agreed, if for difference reasons. He'd been stuck in Shreveport for decades, only when called upon by the Queen or for the occasional vampire summit. He needed out, he thought as he refolded a sweater that looked too crinkled for his taste. But for Pam's benefit, he said, "Oh?"

"Yes," Pam said conversationally. "How many V-necks do you expect to be needing, anyway?"

Eric smiled brilliantly at her, showing fang. "I expect I'll be changing often, bloodied clothes and all," he said quite cheerfully.

"Oh yes," agreed Pam, returning his smile. "I'd be jealous if I wasn't so pleased for you. Not that I'll ever trust Bill Compton, but this is exactly what you need. You've been out of sorts for too long, and a good fight is what you need to recharge, to clear your head,"

Pam said this rather matter-of-factly, and Eric decided that even as his progeny (or perhaps _as_ his progeny) she presumed too much and was treading dangerous waters. Yet he let her go on, and he wondered he did so because privately he agreed, because there was some sense to what she had said. He needed to feed more than his belly; he needed to spill blood to fulfill the primal urges of his Viking and vampire nature. He needed to fight, he needed _excitement_.

Something wrestles had awakened in him, and it demanded to be fed to the point it nearly worried him. Eric was no fledgling vampire, and it had been too many centuries since he'd been on the verge of being controlled by his thirsts and desires.

"That thing is ratty as hell, Eric," Pam sight in disapproval, moving over to the bed to snatch a t-shirt from his duffle bag. "All the time I spend, collecting wonderful pieces for you and—"

Her words were cut short when her nostrils flared, catching on to an unmistakable scent. Eric bared his fangs at her, and this time it was no joke. He knew exactly what was about to fall out of her mouth and he did not want to hear it. Pam dropped the offending garment in disgust.

"I have let you run your mouth long enough, Pamela. I will not have my own progeny disrespect me as you have. I have turned the other cheek out of sentiment, but you do not seem capable of reigning yourself in when enough is enough,"

He would have left it there, but Pam's eyes were burning with something other than the rage he expected. No, he could feel a great deal of agitation from her.

"May I speak freely, Master?"

He considered her request only for a moment.

"You may."

As though it pained her to admit such a thing, Pam confessed, "I worry a great deal, Master, that you are in a precarious position,"

This was news to him. Despite the hell that had been dropped into their laps in recent months, he'd never grown concerned over his title. "You believe my position as sheriff is at risk?"

"No. This has nothing to do with vampire politics, and everything to do with blood. Our bloodline," she added, pausing to evaluate his response.

"Go on," prompted Eric when she failed to continue.

"I am aware of the uniqueness of our bloodline," Pam said very carefully. "And each night I rise the being that even human I was always meant to be reborn as, I am grateful I was chosen by you, by the nobility of your blood. As much as I love being what I am, there is no other vampire that could have fit me as you do,"

Eric glanced over at the clock on his nightstand. Pam was usually so forward and direct, and if she didn't speed things up, he'd be late at Compton's. But he couldn't remember the last time she had ever spoken with such care, and so he was reluctant to hurry her up.

"I have always respected your Godric. I even have love for his memory. But since he met the True Death, I have been unable to forgive him." Again she paused to take his measure. He understood her hesitation; his first instinct even now was to defend his dead maker. Even in true death, Eric would always show Godric great loyalty. But Pam hadn't exactly insulted Godric, at least not yet.

"I am unable to forgive the pain he caused you by choosing to meet the sun," said Pam, and here her voice grew a little heated. "I am unable to forgive that had you not been alerted to his disappearance, he would not have had last words for you. I am unable to forgive that he chose himself over his own progeny," again Pam paused. "All this to say, Eric, I'm worried that the same weakness had by your maker is cursed in our blood."

Eric was absolutely stunned. "You worry you will befall the same fate? Pamela—"

Pam shook her head. With some difficulty, she said, "I worry you will, Eric."

If he thought he'd been stunned before, now he was stunningly floored. He scoured his mind for an explanation, for what he might have said or done to garner such a fear in his progeny. He came up empty.

"I'm certainly older than most," said Eric. "And yes I've been bored for some time now, but Pamela, banish the thought. Immediately,"

But blood tears were collecting at the corners of her eyes, and her voice trembled with just as much fear as it did anger. "You've just been taking so many risks. It's unlike you. Don't forget what landed us in Louisiana in the first place—you were bored, and it made you reckless. We're lucky someone in the Authority recognized you were better as a Sheriff than dead—and all that for what, over a fuck in the moonlight?"

"Hardly my best judgment, fine, but—"

"Russell Edgington," Pam said flatly. A sharp nail pointed accusingly at his old shirt. "And even worse, the little witch bitch,"

"Sasha is gone," Eric said coolly. But his tone was only such on the surface; below it was simmering dangerously.

"That's what makes this so awful! You're pining!" exclaimed Pam.

Eric stared at the shirt. He most certainly was not pining. Yet even he no explanation for why he was packing the shirt. It was, as she'd so astutely pointed out, old and worn. But most recently, it had been worn by Sasha Buckley and her scent still lingered strongly. Just as it lingered in his apartment, in his very bed. Though he couldn't describe just what he felt, he knew that he wasn't _fucking pining_ , and his progeny just couldn't understand, being as young as she was. Russell Edgington had taken it to the extreme, but it was quite common for vampires of their age to take an interest in unusual beings, whether they were witches or telepaths. The longer a vampire lived, the smaller the world got, and Eric, who had had exploration and adventure even in his human blood and heart, feared the day there would be nothing left to discover. He feared that far more than he worried about whatever fascination he had for the witch, though he knew that it was best to rein it in presently.

"I have never harbored a desire to meet the sun out of sheer boredom, nor will I, Pamela. My maker's actions are not for us to forgive, just as it was never my choice to make for him. I will forever mourn Godric, but I must respect his choice," The words tasted bitter on his tongue, like dead blood. Only his maker's command made him 'respect' Godric's decision to meet the sun, but he had no wish to dwell on the thought. "You must not fear for me, understand?"

"Yes," Pam said tearfully. She quickly brushed a tear away before it could fall completely. It still left a smear of blood under her bottom lashes

Eric eyed his progeny carefully, assessing her. "Have you come to doubt me, then? Doubt my ability as your maker to keep you safe?"

Pam blanked.

"Oh Eric, no!" she cried out. "I would never! But—"

"Yet you've questioned me with unprecedented insolence as of late," Eric cut her off. She grew still, and he felt a sense of shame from her end of the bond as she recognized the truth in his words. "I've let it slide thus far, even when I would have mocked another vampire for allowing his progeny to scheme against him as you have me. You moved against Sasha even when you knew I had no wish to see her dead. I was fine allowing the matter to be settled between you two. But you continue to doubt me. If you cannot see that my anger has less to do with Sasha herself and more to do with your own actions, then you are pettier than I thought,"

Eric paused only for a moment, to be certain she heard the finality of his next words. "If I have to hear your opinion on witch and your presumptions again, I will Command your mouth shut. Are we clear?"

The snarl of displeasure from low in her throat was what set him off. He was on top of her in an instant, pressing her into the carpet by his bed with a hand wrapped tightly around her throat. She wouldn't miss the air, but he saw her face contort in pain. Eric held on for a moment longer, then let go when her anger began to dissipate into satisfaction.

"I hear and obey you, master," she said. He rose, watching his progeny critically. Had this been what she'd been after all along? A glimmer of the ruthless vampire she preferred him as? The sort that would throw her down and bend her to his will forcibly if he felt so inclined?

"You're right," said Eric, putting the shirt back into its place in his travel bag. "Some time apart will do us good,"

* * *

 _Our call will have to wait_.

Sasha glared at Eric's text message, wondering just what the hell was more important than her meeting with the Queen. When her bratty impulse abated, she realized that for the Sheriff of Area Five, Louisiana, the answer was probably a lot. It certainly hadn't been her priority during her last few days in the Bayou State, but now she wondered what state the Louisiana vampires were in. Even a failed vampire coup required clean up, and Sasha could imagine that things were tense as ever even now that the rebellion had been squashed. She knew Eric had pledged himself to King Bill Compton, and Compton would be a fool not to call up on the warrior vampire to aid him in taking back his empire. Where would a witch states away fit into his list of priorities?

Her first instinct was to worry. Then she laughed; who was she to worry about a vampire like him? Eric Northman could more than take care of himself, and whatever place she had in his life, it wasn't to worry after him.

Still, the realization left her to stare unhappily at the phone in her hands. Whatever Eric's priorities were, had hundreds of burning questions for him regarding the Queen, their possible history, and just what the hell the Queen might have against her.

After her meeting with the Queen, Luca Emond had dropped her off at the apartment, but not before suggesting they grab a bite to eat. Her eyes had bugged out so far out of her head she'd been surprised they hadn't popped out and rolled into the busy street, and after turning him down, she'd been increasingly suspicious of his agreeable personality. Yesterday she'd been the gum stuck to the bottom on his show, and today she was, what? Dateable? Uh-huh.

It was while she shopped for groceries (apparently New Yorkers could have just about anything delivered online, any time) that she realized that Emond's behavior was likely linked to his newfound knowledge that she belonged to Eric. She hadn't pondered it so much before—she was more preoccupied with the fucking Queen with a grudge than her creepy driver—but now it clicked. The question was, to what end? She stowed the thought away to share with Eric; maybe he would see sense in removing Luca Emond from her immediate vicinity now.

Her groceries were delivered not even two hours later. Sasha had only gotten a few staples, enough to tide her over until she went out for a proper grocery haul, but enough that she was able to get a nice omelet going on the stove.

Eric called her as she was curling up on the couch with a blanket and mug of tea.

"Evening," said Sasha. She wasn't sure how he'd be; if he'd moved passed their disagreement from the night before or not. She hoped he had, because just the sight of his name on her caller ID had sent her heart beating in time with her phone's vibration of the incoming call, and just the anticipation of hearing his voice was exciting his blood in her veins.

 _Fucking bond_.

" _Evening, my other brat_ ," Eric didn't sound upset, only tired.

"Am I to assume that your other brat is your favorite bald—sorry, blonde?" Sasha asked innocently. She'd never thought of herself as malicious or disparagingly petty, but the fact that her spell had left Pam bald could only have satisfied her more if she'd wielded a razor herself. Besides, it had also saved Vampire Barbie's life.

" _You're in a better mood_ ," he said approvingly, ignoring the jibe at his progeny. "Am I to assume the meeting with the Queen was not a total disaster?"

Not a total disaster? Maybe he really did know Salma more than he had let on.

"Yes," said Sasha. "But you're tired. Do you want to talk another night?"

" _Not at all. After all the idiotic vampires I endured tonight, your voice is very soothing to me_ ,"

When Eric Northman complimented you, it was impossible not to glow with pleasure, _fucking blood bond_ or not. He could certainly be very flirtatious with his choice in flattery, but Sasha had learned that his best compliments were those he didn't intend to make. There were comments or observations he made so simply, so casually, so genuinely, that their effect was anything but simple. Sasha had never thought of her voice as soothing; there was just too much of Southern California weaved into it. But Eric's compliment pleased her (her and her blood; it instantly warmed and gave her reason to shed the blanket around her.

" _What is it_?" he asked, and she detected enough interest there that told her he had felt her emotions spike, but couldn't understand the reason. His curiosity only reinforced that his words had been genuine.

"The Queen implied you had a thing for her," Sasha said do distract him.

" _Did she? What were her words?_ "

"She said we looked alike, me and her. It was the first thing she said to me, saying that was why you liked me. That you were that desperate for her attention,"

" _And your answer?_ "

"I told her she honored me by making such a comparison," said Sasha. Eric chuckled.

" _I'll bet she loved that_ ," he murmured. " _And if you were left wondering, I have never been infatuated with the Queen._ "

 _Good,_ thought Sasha. _She's a bitch_.

" _She was testing our bond,_ " Eric went on. "You answered her well, and it sounds to me as though you were able to hold your own. There is no one else I would have chosen in your place to represent me,"

Again, Sasha flushed with the warmth of pride his appraisal conjured.

"Well, it's not like you didn't play your own part," said Sasha modestly. "I can't even begin to imagine how expensive it was, although I wish you would have told me before hand so I wouldn't look like an idiot,"

"I'd say you're worth every penny, but I don't quite follow," said Eric.

She rolled her eyes; was _he_ trying to be modest?

"You know, the Queen's fee? For allowing me to reside in the city?"

" _What fee, Sasha_?" demanded Eric.

Sasha's neck prickled with unease as she sat up straighter in her nest of blankets. "The Queen—she said she wasn't allowing anymore witches into the city, said she was only letting me in because the price had already been paid, that a promise had been made. She said it my benefactor—I thought she meant you, of course!"

" _I expected some form of payment would be involved_ ," Eric said seriously. " _But Sasha, I didn't expect her to name a price until after meeting you—she would extort me based on how she felt about you or, more specifically, how she perceived I felt about your worth to me. Short of getting you into the city and providing you with the apartment and a chauffeur, I've paid no fee."_

Okay, she was starting to get severely creeped out now. Her eyes darted towards the hallway, the one that led to the bedrooms.

"Eric," she said carefully, trying to contain the note of panic that had worked its way into her voice. She suddenly felt like she had eyes on her. "Eric did you gift me a coat?"

" _Are you speaking in riddles? What coat?_ "

"In the closet in your bedroom. There was a garment bag over a coat in the empty section," said Sasha, fingers twisting nervously in the fabric of the blanket. "My first thought was that it was Pam's, but it still had tags on it and it looked too small for someone of her height,"

If she thought she'd been agitated, it was nothing compared to the wave of emotion that threatened to flatten her. Eric was on high alert too. Sasha shouldn't have been able to sense Eric's emotions at all, as they had never completed a full blood exchange. She only ever had his blood after nearly dying, post-kidnapping. But she suspected that her witch blood had linked them in new and unexpected ways, and so when his feelings were as strong as they were now or he let his guard down—or as he had attempted on occasion, when he _wanted_ her to feel as he felt—she could glimpse into his emotions.

" _I didn't gift you a coat,_ " said Eric.

"Okay then, an ex-girlfriend maybe?"

" _The only other being to have ever stepped foot inside of that apartment other than myself is dead_ ," Eric said flatly. " _And the cleaning crew, the day you arrived. They were instructed only to clean and make up the bed. The service I use is discreet and trusted, but I will make inquiries. Was there anything else in the apartment that shouldn't have been there?_ "

"I don't think so," said Sasha fretfully. "Actually, the kitchen was really well stocked in terms of kitchenware. Like pots and pans and things. I thought that was you or left over from some human guests or something,"

" _It hadn't crossed my mind to have those things made available to you,"_ admitted Eric. " _Only the coffee device,"_

He'd remembered how she took her coffee enough to have his lawyer pick up some for her; it wasn't a stretch he'd bought her a coffee maker.

" _I'll call Emond. He can sweep the place, see if there's anything out of order,"_

"No," Sasha said quickly. "Not him. I think it's fine, really. I'm just overreacting,"

" _Overreacting?_ " growled Eric. " _Even around witches, things like coats and kitchenware doesn't just appear out of nowhere_ , _Sasha,_ "

"Maybe your maid service is just really thorough," argued Sasha. "And maybe Pam just forgot about the coat,"

" _Don't be ridiculous,_ " said Eric. " _Pam has never been in that apartment, only—_ "

"Only?"

" _It is possible_ ," Eric said slowly. " _That the items in the kitchen have been there for a while. The apartment was a gift from my maker well before Revelation; at the time, it was common to keep apartments human-fashioned—kitchens and bathrooms specifically, so as not to diminish the apartment's value or arouse suspicion. I never took interest in the kitchen for obvious reasons, so I cannot confirm that the items weren't there before,"_

"Okay, that makes much more sense," said Sasha, nodding to herself. "And besides, no one would have been allowed access to the apartment, right?"

" _Correct. I suppose it is possible that the coat was a gift for Pam and I simply don't remember. Perhaps I left it once I realized it would not fit,_ " said Eric, though he sounded a lot less sure of his second theory. " _Still, I would feel better about calling Emond and having you stay with him or in a hotel,_ "

"I think I'll be fine. Besides, I don't trust Emond," said Sasha. She quickly explained his sudden one-eighty in behavior.

" _Emond won't be a problem unless he touches you,_ " Eric said coolly, and Sasha had the sense that Eric wasn't talking about physically harming her. " _Do I really have to explain to you that he wants to bed you?"_

"What?!" she squawked. "Did you not listen to anything I said?"

" _His change in behavior occurred after he learned that you are mine, correct?_ " asked Eric. His exasperation, as though he were explain the obvious to a child, was unappreciated.

"Yes," she gritted out.

" _I'm paying him handsomely to be at your beck and call. He won't jeopardize a payday like that no matter how much he dislikes me personally. But get under my skin…well, I'm not surprised he'd get it into his head to fuck my human, not when I fucked his fiancé,"_

"Oh," said Sasha. "Eric, that's fucked up,"

" _I'm hardly the one to blame,_ " dismissed Eric. " _It wasn't like I set out to seduce his woman into my bed. She came to me. Repeatedly,"_

Sasha rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Still, I don't think you need to call anyone or arrange anything. I'll be fine,"

" _Stubborn_ ," said Eric. He said it good-naturedly enough she took that he agreed with her. " _Still, be on the look out for anything suspicious. I'm tied up with the King, but I still expect you to keep me informed of your progress in magic and dealings in the City. I'll do my best to find out what the Queen's fee was, and what this promise she mentioned is,"_

They discussed her meeting with the Queen for just a little while longer, until Eric finally excused himself. Before he went, Sasha asked how he was doing, which seemed to stump the ancient vampire.

" _Speaking to you, clearly,_ " he said promptly.

"Not _what_ are you doing. _How_ are you. You know, with the hold King/rebellion thing," she sounded awkward inquiring after his well being—it was much more personal than anything they'd talked about thus far that night.

Eric seemed to process the same thing, because he remained quiet long enough she regretted her question.

" _I'm doing well. I expect blood will be shed, which has put me in high spirits,_ " he said sounding oddly formal.

"Oh. Good for you," Sasha said rather lamely. "Okay, guess we'll talk next time I update you. Have fun with your bloodshed,"  
" _Oh, I will,_ " promised Eric with a touch of just too much eagerness. " _And you stay out of it,_ "

Sasha didn't make any promises. These days, bloodshed found her even when she was purposefully looking the other way.

Her tea was cold by then, and so Sasha dumped it in the sink and washed out her mug. Her conversation with Eric had gone better than expected, and she was glad that now that she'd decided somewhat where she stood with him, it was easy to remain cordial with him. Emotional distance didn't have to equal total apathy, and some level of pleasantness made it easier to trust each other.

There was one thing that continued to nag her, enough that after she was ready for bed, she stopped by the closet Sasha unzipped the garment bag slowly, carefully pushing it off the shoulders of the coat and hanger until it crumpled to the floor.

It really was a beautiful coat. She ran her hands over the soft velvet; it was a dark blue, though it had depths of color under the light. But there was something else; a hint of static between her skin and the velvet material, one that wasn't caused by natural friction.

This coat was enchanted.

She should have stepped away them. For all she knew the coat was a trap. But instead she investigated further, searching the pockets on the side, running a finger over each bronze button and zipper. Finally she found something, inside the left breast pocket. A note on simple cardstock.

 _Use it well._


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3: Girl On Fire**

After a relatively early phone call to Luca Emond, Sasha learned that most supes in the city operated on a vampire schedule. To his deep aggravation, since she already had him in the phone, she arranged to meet with him at sundown.

By the time the late afternoon rolled around, Sasha was restless, more than ready to meet with the local coven. Now that she had Queen Salma's permission to be in the city and practice magic, there was no excuse to sit around on her hands and waste time. Sasha found that sitting around was the last thing she needed anyway; it only opened up her mind to intricate scenarios of all the ways her life could go wrong from here. It had occurred to her more than once, that despite it being a concrete jungle surrounded by water, there was still plenty to burn of New York City. When just the day before the view of the Park had been very attractive to her, the novelty had faded and was now a cause of anxiety.

And so, by the time she was waiting for Luca Emond at sundown on the sidewalk of her building, Sasha was a ball of nervous energy less concerned with what might happen to her and more with what she might inadvertently do. She had to have more trust in herself, she finally realized, but it was easier said than done.

As far as she could tell, he had arrived on foot, or that he had parked the car nearby. Parking in the city was a bitch she knew, and he'd told her over the phone they'd be taking a cab to their destination.

"You look great," greeted Emond when he stopped in front of her. He himself was back in his leather jacket and jeans combo, handsome as ever with a grey scarf wrapped around his throat. The heat wave had died down over the last day, and a nipping chill had returned to the city.

"I'm not going to sleep with you," Sasha said by way of greeting. She'd had plenty of time to think it over, and she'd decided that direct confrontation would be best. Eric insisted on using Emond, then fine. She needed to know she could trust him personally without secondhand trust.

His smile dropped, and he scowled at her.

"What did Northman say?" he asked.

"He said he'd been with your fiancé, and that you wanted to sleep with me to get back at him," said Sasha. "Is that untrue?"

Emond pursed his lips. Sasha could tell that his first instinct was to deny. Finally he shrugged. "It sounded less childish in my head,"

"Sure," said Sasha. "Look, whatever did or didn't happen is between you, Eric, and your fiancé—ex-fiancé I assume. I'm not involved, and I have bigger issues to focus on, so, okay?"

Emond nodded stiffly. She could tell that he didn't like being spoken to this way, but that he also knew he had little ground to stand on to argue otherwise. And with a face like that, Sasha was certain that he was used to getting his way—she felt a little satisfaction at being the one to dose him a big spoonful of _NO_.

"Anything you'd like to add? I know there's got to be more, whatever Eric says. The second we met you didn't like me. I didn't exactly vibe with you either,"

Emond sighed. He glanced at the street around them. Other than her doorman a little ways off, they were mostly alone. "All supes have a 'vibe', yes?"

"Sure," she agreed. "And?"

"And like you said, ours don't…mesh well," said Emond. "You set my alarm bells off,"

"You know I'm just a witch, right?" she said with a shrug. "I'm sure Eric told you as much,"

"Yes," he frowned. "But I very much doubt that's the whole truth,"

Could a part of him sense the Fire Affinity in her? Her skin twitched uncomfortably at the thought.

"Look, all that matters is this: if you're not comfortable or ready to perform what Eric hired you to do—be that personal vendetta against me _or_ him—then just say it now. If you can, then great, and let's shake on it. I'm not here to make enemies,"

"I mean what I said, about the alarm bells," said Emond. "But I admit that you are preferable to Northman,"

"A compliment if I ever heard one," drawled Sasha.

He offered his hand. She shook it; even through her brown leather gloves, she felt a small spark between them. Emond was quick to snatch his hand away and shove it into his pockets.

"Still mum on what you are, huh?" said Sasha. "Maybe witches and whatever you are, maybe we're just natural enemies, like Weres and vamps,"

She meant it as a joke, but on second thought…

"We don't need to talk about what I am. I'll do my job," said Emond "Besides, I don't have a problem with witches. Well, only one,"

"Should that worry me? I'm trying to get on the witch's _good_ side," said Sasha. She was getting skeptically about Luca Emond all over again.

"Like I said, only one," said Emond, turning from her to hail a cab. His tall frame combined with a raised, muscular arm was quick to draw the attention of a driver, and soon a cab pulled over for them.

* * *

Sasha was not surprised that Luca Emond took her to a bar to meet witches. Bars and clubs were among the most common types of establishments owned by supes, and so she did not bat an eye when the cab driver dropped them off in front of a tavern called _Abracadabra_.

Tacky, sure, but Sasha soon realized that it was a private joke, because like the Queen's block palace, the eyes of the mortals around them seemed to skip right over the bar front, from the Chinese restaurant on the left to the travel agency on the right.

"Any witch you want to find in the city—if they don't come through here regularly, someone in here will know how to get in touch with them," said Luca Emond. From conversation, Sasha learned that Eric had left it up to her what she told Emond, and she decided she did not want to tell him that the witch in question she sought out was Emmett Lafleur; despite her talk with him, she felt no inclination to share her entire life with the man. He was still sketchy as fuck.

"Good. There isn't like, a password or anything, right?" she asked.

"All supes are welcome," said Emond. "Well, I say all supes. Some more than others. Vampires and witches have a precarious relationship in this city. They collaborate, but they don't exactly share watering holes. These witches, they an be pretty tight knit, and I can tell you they probably won't like your relationship to Northman, but they'll hear you out,"

Not sure if that made her feel better or not, Sasha squared her shoulders and reached a hand into the pocket of her coat to thumb the small card there. Since she'd put it on, she had found some comfort from the little note written there.

Eric would probably verbally eviscerate her when he found out that she'd chosen to wear the coat that hung in the closet, especially when she told him that she had realized it was enchanted. But Sasha couldn't explain it; it didn't matter from who or what or where the coat was from: it was _hers_ , and she knew as such because of the note. She was convinced it was something of a message for her. She'd worry more about that later. All she knew was that when she'd first put it on in her apartment, she'd only felt good, confident; not like she'd just been cursed or something.

"Okay. Let's do this,"

Unlike when she had walked into a palace of fangs, Sasha was nervous, and not in an excited sort of way. She had more than enough experience with vampires and even vampire royalty thanks to her unconventional upbringing, but she could not say the same about witches. For her, it was the witches that were the most dangerous and unpredictable, not matter that she was one herself. She would be at their mercy, because she was devoid of their culture.

Luca led the way. She decided to think of him as Luca because he'd be her only ally inside the bar, and she could use a friend, even one as sketchy as him.

The inside was warm and woodsy, modeled after an English pub. The ambience was light-hearted, lots of laughter and good-natured yelling. It was obvious that the patrons were regular; no one seemed too concerned with personal space, and witches and warlocks stopped to talk to each other her and there. She could at least tell that they were witches and warlocks, because if they had anything in common at all, it was an undercurrent of eccentricity in the way they did their hair and makeup or in the way that they dressed. It was a bit like being back at school; the arts and theatre kids were obviously distinguishable, and she had just stumbled upon them now.

She hoped the blue velvet coat she'd traded for her designer trench coat would help her blend in.

"Drink first, then talk," Emond— _Luca_ said. Sasha shrugged; he knew local custom better.

They made their way to the bar, a sprawling piece of oak whose surface was inlaid with a layer of pennies for a coppery glimmer. Sasha admired it briefly, at least until the bartender came up to them.

"Well look at what the cat dragged in," said the witch behind the bar. She was a pretty Puerto Rican woman, as identified by her accent, with a headful of dark ringlets and red streaks and high plump cheeks. Her lips were very rosey, and she was dressed in flared jeans and a tight busty tank top. Luca smiled charmingly at her.

"Maria," he greeted, rolling his tongue with an unnecessary flourish. "You're as beautiful as ever,"

"And you're still full of shit," she shot back. "Who's your friend?"

Maria had picked Sasha out as a newcomer immediately—as had the rest of the bar. Although people carried on with their own business, she found that eyes occasionally drifted her way, and she felt more than just eyes; the probing sensation of magic was there too as creatures tried to get into her head. Maybe she imagined it, but her coat felt a little heavier, and then the pressure on her head was gone.

"Sasha," She didn't extend her hand; Maria didn't seem the type. "I'm new to the city,"

"And the first thing you do is strike up with this guy? You have shit luck," Maria informed her.  
"Just one witch you're not popular with, huh?" asked Sasha, lifting an eyebrow in the direction of Luca. She turned to Maria.

"He's more of a tour guide than anything," she said. "Like I said, I'm new to the city, but I'm new to other things, too. And you witches don't have a website,"

Maria scrutinized her, if a little suspiciously, from the top of her curly hair down to her brown boots. She smacked a palm down on the bar top.

"What's your poison?"

"Bourbon," said Sasha. Maria looked at Luca expectantly, and he ordered a beer from her. Within seconds, both of their drinks were in front of them, and Maria moved down the bar to resume conversation with another patron. Sasha smiled as she took a sip of her drink; she had the feeling that she'd passed inspection, enough so at least that she wasn't getting kicked out of the bar.

"You're an absolute hit with women," observed Sasha as she took a sip of her drink.

"You have no idea," he muttered. That earned raised eyebrows, and so he smiled devilishly at her. "It is the gentlemen in me that keeps me from being too charming—trust me, there is such a thing. So I turn if off,"

 _More like turn me off,_ thought Sasha.

"You're telling me that for the good virtue and dignity of women everywhere you act like this?" Sasha asked skeptically.

"Like I said," he shrugged. "And besides, you are…different. My first instinct isn't to make you swoon," he frowned as he said this more to himself. He missed seeing Sasha's expression.

Sasha, on her part, was somewhat offended. It wasn't like she _wanted_ Luca Emond to want her or anything, but geez.

Her drinking buddy was still very pensive next to her, and Sasha focused her eyes on the dirty mirror behind the bar, quietly observing the rest of the room from her position. She didn't like having her back to a roomful of unknown supes, but she had little choice, at least unless she wanted to come across as suspicious as fuck.

Her careful mirror gazing was why she saw the witch storming their way in the first place. Luca, engrossed as he was in his own thoughts, noticed his approach too, or perhaps he just sensed danger because his shoulders tensed beneath the leather of his jacket and his fingers curled tightly around his beer.

Sasha turned around in time to see that the man was tall, blond, and very angry. His eyes were fixed on Luca, and it was somehow reassuring; she was all too used to lately being the focus of an attack. Still, she stood her ground, hoping she still appeared casual enough as she turned her eyes on the witch.

"What the hell are you doing here, Emond?"

He had a crisp German accent, and eyes that seemed to burn only for Luca Emond—and not in a hypersexual, lustful way, either. Sasha, along with every other supe in the room, could feel the bristling energy around them, the impending sense of a fight.

"Last I checked, any dispute I had was with you, not your coven. I have every right to be here," Luca spoke quietly, calmly; and yet Sasha still got the sense that he would love nothing more than to rip off the German's head.

"I would not go as far as saying that," said the German. His chest puffed out a bit, and his hands curled a little at his side. This was what Sasha feared; if this witch decided to use magic against them, Sasha was helpless to defend them.

Would she even step in to defend Emond? Whatever was going on between them, it sounded personal, and Sasha didn't want it to taint her chances with the witches. Honestly, what had Eric been thinking, setting her up with Emond? Serious misjudgment on that one.

"And what, you're going to make me leave?" asked Luca. Because _that_ tone of voice had any hopes of diffusing the situation.

"Luca," Sasha said sharply, placing her hand on his forearm. As she did each time she touched him, she had that slight feeling of discomfort, but she overrode the desire to rip her hand away in favor of reminding him that he was working right now, and that she had no desire to have him fuck up her chances with the witches.

Luca looked down at her hand at the same time as the German did. The witch's green eyes found hers, scanning her over. A look of recognition flitted over his features, though Sasha couldn't say she felt the same. As far as she was concerned, she'd never seen the man in her life.

"And you, witch? What is your business here?" asked the German.

"I'm new to the city," Sasha said dryly. Her hand was still on Luca's arm. "I asked Luca to introduce me to the local _friendly_ coven,"

"Is that so?" asked the German. His arms folded across his chest, and although she preferred to see his magic-fingers out of sight, his green t-shirt was now stretching tightly across his biceps; she didn't think he was trying to win her over, either. He was trying to intimidate her in a whole new way.

"Yes, it is so," said Sasha very clearly. She was very aware of the attention of the bar on the three of them. "Am I in the wrong place for what I'm looking for?"

"It depends," said the German, scowling at her. "You did not find what you were looking for yesterday?"

Sasha's eyes narrowed. There was only one thing he could mean—he meant her meeting with the Queen. She cared less that he knew about that and more that he knew anything about her at all—had he been following her? For how long?

But before they could really get into it, the doors blew open and the attention was gone from them very quickly, to what was automatically perceived to be the bigger threat: two vampires were entering the establishment, and if Sasha thought she and Luca were unwelcome, it was nothing to the reception the pair received.

The first vampire was a petite woman with pale blonde hair so fine Sasha had half a mind it should be floating around her. Her dark eyes skimmed over every face in the bar searchingly. With her was a tall Korean boy, looking as anxious as his companion did severe—which was to say, very. His dark hair was mussed all about his face, and Sasha felt a pang in her heart as she realized he reminded her of Jack, Jack who she hadn't spoken to in weeks.

"Can I help you fine fangs with anything?" barked out Maria from the bar, watching the pair expectantly. She sounded like she wasn't up to doing much more than help them find the door; the silver-tipped bat suddenly placed on the bar top really communicated that desire to service them.

The blonde vampire glanced at her briefly, then at the bat, disinterestedly.

"I am looking for the one called Teddy," said the vampire.

Teddy, it turned out, was a boy no older than nineteen. He rose from a table off to the side and, though he trembled slightly, he walked forward to the vampires. He was a tall, handsome boy, with dark features and marked cheekbones. But his eyes rarely rested on the blonde; he seemed most concerned with the vampire that trailed after her.

 _Oh_ , thought Sasha. _They're lovers_.

The witches seemed too move, if minutely, to stand in solidarity with their young coven member, standing at his back as he stopped well before the vampire. Luca took a step closer to her; the action drew the German's keen eyes their way.

"I—I'm Teddy," he said. He was putting on a brave front, but they could all tell he was terrified. Sasha, like the rest of the room, braced herself. She wasn't sure what was about to happen or what she could even do, but she was ready.

"My quarrel is not with you, warlock," said the vampire. "But with my own progeny. Damien has proved to me time and again that he is incapable of obedience. He refuses to stop seeing you,"

So quickly a ripple went through the ocean of tension in the room, the vampire had her progeny, Damien, kneeling before Teddy, a hand gripping the vampire's jaw tightly.

Vampire and witch lover did not break eye contact, even as whispers swirled about the room. It seemed the relationship had not been common knowledge.

"The simplest course of action for me to insure your removal from my progeny's life would be your death," said the vampire. Magic crackled in the air, and the vampire's nose twitched. She looked around, as though she was only now considering that she was threatening a young witch at the heart of his own coven. Still she continued. "As that option is unavailable to me, I leave his fate up to you, warlock," To her vampire, she said, "Fangs,"

The vampire jerked her progeny's mouth up, squeezing until his mouth fell open. When she reached a hand in to grasp a fang, Sasha's mouth fell open. She moved forward, but Luca stopped her, setting an arm in front of her to stop her.

"But she's going to—"

"Not your place," hissed Luca.

And it wasn't. Sasha, like the rest of the bar, could only look on in horror as the vampire ripped out her progeny's left fang. Damien cried out as she did, and a fountain of blood sprayed out across the floor until a single _clink!_ The fang had fallen to the floor.

Teddy looked shocked, his mouth twitching as he tried to form words.

"See him again and I will remove the other fang. Contact him and I will remove his tongue—that or another part of him you seem so very fond of. Am I clear, warlock?"

The poor witch could only nod tearfully, so grief stricken was he over his lover.

"Pick yourself up, Damien, and your fang too. We're leaving," said the vampire.

And then the two vampires did just that, and they were gone as quickly as they had come.

It was one of the worst things Sasha had ever seen, and she'd seen a lot, especially lately. But watching a vampire stripped of something so inherently—well, _vampire!—_ was so atrociously wrong! She couldn't help but think of the fangs that Eric had had made into earrings for her, or the time that he had told her that, had she died by her fault, Eric would have had Pam's fangs. Had he really meant that? Because that was, that was just awful.

The warlock Teddy left soon after, distraught and unwilling to speak to any of his fellow witches. The bar was filled with talk of the vampire and the revelation of the relationship—it hadn't only been unknown, but now Sasha realized also very frowned upon.

The German, at least, didn't do much ore than shoot a look at Luca—the sort that said _this isn't over_ —and then walked out of the bar, talking rapidly on the phone as he went. Sasha looked around the tavern at all the gossiping witches (she was hardly interesting to any of them anymore, at least) and sighed.

She was out the door in seconds. Luca caught up with her a few blocks over, grumbling that he'd paid for their drinks.

"Home is that way," he told her, pointing in the opposite direction of where she was walking. "I'll get you a cab. You can try with the witches another, less exciting night,"

"Not going home," she told him, standing on the tiptoes of her boots to look over the heads of the crowded sidewalk. There! She saw spotted a blur of burgundy up ahead, the same as the jacket that Teddy had been wearing.

"Listen, you can go be free or whatever. I'll call you if I need you," said Sasha. She took off at a jog, ignoring Luca's cry from somewhere behind her.

"Teddy!" she called as he reached him. The young warlock looked surprised to see her, frowning when he did not recognize her.

"Do I know you?" he asked distractedly.

"Uh, no," she said, smiling awkwardly. "I was back at that bar,"

"Look, just leave me alone," said Teddy, trying to sidestep her. "Whatever you want from me, if you wanna lecture me—"

"I just wanted to see if you're okay," said Sasha.

He looked doubtfully at her, giving her a once over. "You're a witch, right?"

"Right,"

"So then you must know what they all know back there," said Teddy, pointing the way they'd walked. "That I'm a fool, that I can't possibly think I had a future with someone that had fangs, that I'm damn lucky _I'm_ still in one piece,"

"I think you're a fool if you think you can sneak around with that Damien vampire and not get caught," said Sasha. "But I don't think you're a fool for being in love with a vampire,"

Teddy cocked his head to the side, studying her carefully. "Who did you say were again?"

"I guess I didn't. Say who I am, I mean," said Sasha. "I'm Sasha Buckley. Do you want to get a cup of coffee?"

* * *

Teddy didn't like coffee. And so twenty minutes later, Sasha found herself sitting in a vinyl booth in the back of a milkshake bar. The place had an impressive display of self-serve milkshakes with dozens of flavor choices and even more toppings, and she found herself loading up on all the sweet treats she typically would have stayed away from: chocolate and caramel sauce and sprinkles and a whole mess of whipped cream, along with too many maraschino cherries.

Across from her, Teddy was working on a similarly loaded up milkshake. She thought she may as well as break the ice with him now. After all, she'd been privy to his vampire boyfriend behind defanged by his own maker—what really was too personal, at this point?

"Did you have his blood?" asked Sasha conversationally, as though she had asked how long they'd been in a relationship in.

Teddy's spoon clattered down loudly to the tabletop, causing her eyes to flit from the ice cream running over the sides of her milkshake (there were a couple scoops to top off the whole things). His eyes narrowed once more with suspicion as he gazed at her.

"Did my Uncle send you?" he asked accusingly. "Trying to what, butter me up with ice cream so that I'll just spill on all the details about my relationship? That's rich,"

"I suggested coffee," Sasha said calmly. "You suggested ice cream. And I don't know who your uncle is, so I think it's very unlikely that I know him. I was just making conversation,"

"That's making conversation?" he asked stonily. "That's private. Not that I'm saying it happened," he added hastily.

Sasha considered him for a moment, taking a big spoonful of chocolate and caramel. She savored it on her tongue for a moment, until it melted away.

"Is being with a vampire against coven rules? Vampire rules? Both?" she asked.

"I haven't seen you around _Abra_ before," noted Teddy. "Where did you come from?"

"Louisiana," said Sasha.

"New Orleans coven?" he asked interestedly.

"Ah, no," said Sasha with a smile. "I'm coven-less. I'm not an active practitioner. But I want to be,"

Teddy nodded, working away at his milkshake for a while. Finally he sighed. "It's not against the rules, technically,"

She perked up at that bit of information—it would have been truly disastrous for her if vampire/witch love connections were against coven rules—not that what she had with Eric was a love connection, and not that she planned on joining any covens. But it would certainly give the witches reason to dislike her and maybe not want to help her if they thought she was in a relationship with a vampire.

"It's just…I've only lived here in the city all my life, so I can't say I've experienced how it is on the outside," said Teddy. "But I know we got a good deal out here. Our coven has a good deal the vamp's Queen, and it keeps us safe from other vampires—any other supes that might want to use us. But it doesn't necessarily mean we all get along,"

"I'm with you so far," said Sasha, gesturing that he continue.

"Damien's maker never liked that he was with a witch, and she told him to stop seeing me. He didn't," Teddy said flatly as he stated what she already knew. "At first I thought it was so romantic and shit, you know? He said he didn't care, cause he liked me too much. But I guess she really meant it. Why did you ask about the blood?"

"Oh, just curious," said Sasha, catching a stray trail of ice cream and sprinkles on the side of her glass with a finger. She looked at the collection of sugar there, and then grinned at Teddy. "A common side affect of drinking vampire blood is a sweet tooth—only what your body is actually craving is more vampire blood,"

When she winked at him and licked the ice cream off her finger, his eyes widened in shock.

"Wait, you mean you—wow," Teddy looked at her in a way he hadn't all night: like he was warming up to her, and like he was impressed. Excitedly he asked, "I've never met another witch that had done it. Who's your vamp? Someone I know, a local?"

"He's not a local," said Sasha. "He's back in Louisiana,"

"Is that why you came to talk to me? Because you know what it's like?" he asked in confusion.

"I guess, sort of," nodded Sasha. "And, that vampire was a total bitch,"

"You're telling me," said Teddy, shaking his head. "The worst part is, she cares about him and thinks she's doing him _good_. Can you believe that? Thinking that I'm more harmful to him than what she did to him?"

"That's the thing about vampires. They can be so level headed and logical—to a fault, when they don't react to the same things that we react to, don't cry or get scared or angry when we do—and then there's times when they just blow things out of proportion, just because they can be immortal dickheads," said Sasha. Then, more gently, "It'll grow back, you know,"

"It will?" Teddy asked hopefully. "He was my first—vampire," he added quickly, looking embarrassed. "So I didn't really know all that much about them. Still don't, really," he said with a half laugh. "The city ain't that big, but we don't mix that much,"

"It'll be a while, but yes it will grow back," said Sasha. "And I know it sucks—don't give me that look—but you probably really should stay away for a while. I don't think she was kidding about what she said, and body parts take _a lot_ longer to grow back,"

"Oh, she does," Teddy said darkly. "It's so unfair! How can she get away with it? Can she really keep us apart like that? For no reason?"

"You'd have to petition her superior," said Sasha, scraping the bottom of her tall milkshake glass with a spoon to get the last of it. "Which as far as I'm aware would be the Queen, since I don't think Manhattan has a Sheriff, at least not in the traditional sense. It would be up her at that point. Or her maker, I guess,"

"That sounds messy," Teddy said worriedly. "Did you have a similar experience with your vampire?"

"Actually, yes. Only it was the other way around," said Sasha. "His progeny didn't like me, so she tried having me killed,"

"Holy shit. What happened after that?"

"I made her go bald," Sasha said proudly. At his expression, she explained. "With a spell. It was only supposed to turn her hair a really ugly green, but…"

"Shit," Teddy said again. Then he smirked. "If I could make Juliette's hair go green…"

They shared a laugh at that.

"So you're in town to learn from the coven?" asked Teddy. "I could help you out, if you want. I'm been practicing for a while now, and I've gotten good. And my Uncle would help you, too,"

"Thanks, Teddy," smiled Sasha. "Maybe you can help me with something else. I'm looking for a specific witch. His name is Emmett de Fleur. You know where I can find him?"  
"Uh, my house," said Teddy. "He's my Uncle,"

"Seriously?" asked Sasha. "Oh, well that's fantastic! When can you take me to meet Emmett?"

"There's no need, Miss Buckley. I'm standing right here,"

Sasha was startled; she hadn't seen him approach, but a tall man that vaguely resembled Teddy was now standing over their table. At his shoulder was the German witch from _Abracadabra;_ Sasha remembered seeing him walking out on the phone. She had a good guess who was on the other side of the call now.

"Teddy, what is this I hear about you causing trouble with vampires?" asked Emmett, directing his attention to his nephew. His voice was smooth like melted chocolate, warm like jazz. Yet despite his words and attention being directed at his nephew, Sasha had the feeling she was the one being sized up.

She did some sizing up of her own. Emmett de Fleur was the most well-dressed man in the establishment. Where as his companion was in jeans and a jacket, he wore a suit in wine-red and a silky green tie. His coat was a slightly darker purple. On his fingers was a collection of gold rings. He had a flare of quiet power about him.

Teddy wasn't having any of it. He threw a dirty look at the German, then stood up, reaching for his wallet. He tossed down some bills to cover both their milkshakes. He nodded at Sasha, offering her a tight smile.  
"Thanks for the talk, Sasha. I'll see you around,"

And then he was stalking away.

"Would you like me to go after him?" asked the German.

 _Kiss ass,_ thought Sasha.

"Thank you, Nikolas, but that will be unnecessary," said the witch known as Cousin Emmett. "I'll deal with him when he's had a chance to cool off."

Turning to Sasha, he said, "I hear you're looking for me,"

Sasha glanced between the two witches; she didn't like that they were both standing over her. She slipped a hand into her pocket and toyed with the note there.

 _Use it well_.

Her eyes settled on Nikolas. "I guess I know who had me followed, then,"

"I like to know who's in my city," said Emmett.

"I thought it was the Queen's city," said Sasha. "The Queen you already know I met with; so go on, ask what you really want to ask,"

"Very well," said Nikolas. Again he crossed his arms—he either really liked intimidating her, or he was exceptionally proud of his biceps. "Why did you meet with the Vampire Queen?"

"I came to New York to meet with Emmett de Fleur," said Sasha, nodding to the warlock in question. She did not plan on lying, but she didn't plan on revealing her whole hand, either. "I need your help learning how to control the magic growing inside of me,"

"And how does this involve the Queen?" asked Nikolas. Emmett seemed content letting him ask the questions; he simply watched her through grave eyes. She felt that odd sensation on her once again, like she had at the bar—like someone was putting weight on her, and she saw Emmett flinch.

"She runs the city, she likes to control the number of supes in it," said Sasha, pretending she was oblivious to his attempts to either get into her head or otherwise enchant her. "I didn't want to create more problems than I needed by making it seem like I was trying to sneak into her city,"

"Yes, wise," said Nikolas, his green gaze unflinching. "But most do not know that—especially inexperienced witches. Why meet with the Queen before you met with us? We would have vouched for you as a coven,"

"Because I'm better versed in vampire etiquette than I am in witch protocol," said Sasha. "And I belong to a foreign vampire,"

Nikolas made no attempts in hiding that he looked disgusted. "I still do not understand why you chose to speak to the vampire's Queen first,"

 _Aha—the_ vampire's _queen. Not my Queen,_ Sasha noted with interest.

"When a vampire crosses state—or Area, for that matter—lines, they must present themselves to that territories' leader, typically to gain permission. That applies to any of their pets," said Emmett, looking at Sasha as though to dare her to argue against his chosen word. "Unless that vampire wants to risk giving the impression that their pet is acting as an agent on their behalf,"

And oh, she dared.

"I'm not a pet," said Sasha. "I'm here because I want to be,"

"Sponsored, no doubt, by your vampire?" prompted Emmett. "I have no doubt that your vampire was very eager to finance your education in the area of magic—it's the ambition of so many vampires to have a witch under their thumb, though I have to say that yours didn't luck out so much. I can't detect a shred of power off you, girl, and if I were you I'd turn tail and run before your vampire realizes you won't be able to whore out anything more than what's between your legs,"

The sleeve of Emmett's jacket caught on fire. One second Sasha was glaring at it as she tried to reel in the very sudden burst of anger that he'd conjured and the next, she felt better, if only for a second, because the witch was on fire.

The witch was on fire.

Sasha leapt to her feet, looking around wildly for something, _anything_ that might put the fire out. Nikolas too had yelped and sprung to his feet, his hands in front of him as he started to chant something; at which point Sasha realized that no one in the shake shop found it odd that a man had spontaneously combusted. Then she realized that they were wrapped up in some form of magical cloak or other, and that no one in the restaurant could _see_ them.

She turned back just in time to see Emmett place a hand over the flame, as though he were squashing it: the flame died out.

Emmett, on his part, looked tranquil. But Sasha detected that beneath his calm exterior his thoughts were racing, and she couldn't blame him; she'd just set him on fire at a glance. Then again, he'd just called her a whore, so she didn't feel _that_ bad.

"Was that…?" Nikolas trailed off.

"Was that what?" she asked. "That was me pissed off, if you hadn't noticed,"

"You are a Fire Affinity," said Emmett quietly, rising to his feet to come stand before her. He was looking at her through new eyes.

Nikolas exclaimed something in German. Her German was pretty rusty, but she understood that it meant _shit!_

"Yes, and maybe next time I'll lead with that," said Sasha uneasily. "That's why I came to find you. I need you to help me control it before I do a lot worse than what I just did to you. Again," she added as an afterthought.

Emmett and Nikolas exchanged a glance.

"How did you come to learn of me?" Emmett asked her. "Who directed you to me? A fang?"

"No, not a vampire. A witch. A dead one, actually. My grandmother's ghost," said Sasha. "Her name is Cookie Montgomery,"

The name seemed to have no effect on Nikolas, but the same did not hold true for Emmett de Fleur.

"Well shit,"

* * *

Until last night, Bill Compton's rebellion—or rather, the rebellion _against_ —Bill Compton had worked in Eric's favor, if only to serve as a reminder of his true nature. His distaste for vampire politics was being challenged: the promise of an impending fight coupled with the unknown dangers of possible insurgencies kept him on his toes. He might not like getting embroiled so far into the politics of his kind that his ambitions grew beyond his current position of Sheriff, but being named the King's temporary enforcer had its benefits.

Namely, the benefit of having first kill.

Still, with thoughts of distance from the witch still present on his mind, Eric wondered if sending her off to New York had been a mistake. Eric didn't like games he wasn't in control of, and he had the terrible feeling that Sasha Buckley had stumbled upon a game he had not been invited too and, worse of all, one he did not know the rules of. When his mind wasn't consumed with the state of Louisiana, he pondered the suspicious circumstances of his Upper East Side apartment. There were only two possible explanations for the oddities Sasha had described, and one of them involved a vampire that had met the true death.

Eric's maker weighed heavily on his mind that night, no doubt summoned by his very own progeny. He had as little of a desire to dwell on Pamela's words as he had on suicide; despite what she thought, he was not so melancholy that he flirted with the idea of meeting the sun—not even when he'd walked into a burning building for Sasha Buckley. He'd known he'd survive; it had not even been a question in his mind. He'd trusted the witch would not let him burn, and she'd proven he wasn't a fool. After all, he'd walked out of that building without so much as a singed hair.

Had his maker been alive, Eric could only imagine what words Godric would have for him now. Certainly he'd caution him, as Pam attempted to, though ultimately Godric had always allowed him to learn from his own mistakes. Briefly he wondered what an interaction between his maker and his witch would have gone like, but he concluded it was impossible to say: both were unpredictable, even to him.

And because of course, Godric was dead.

It had been Godric that had gifted him the Manhattan apartment. It had been something of a strange gift, given that he was able to spend very little time in Manhattan, but for all his infinite wisdom and patience, Godric had also been a vampire of passionate whims. In the more recent century, he'd taken an interest in interior design and restoration, and Eric had hardly been able to keep up with the dozens of properties his maker had bought, restored, and then flipped for profit. As Eric understood it, the Manhattan apartment had been one such property, until he'd fallen so in love with the outcome of his labor he'd decided to keep it and gift it to his progeny.

Eric had kept the apartment private, a possible bolthole in case he ever needed to seek the protection (and red tape) that only a territory like Manhattan could provide. He had considered fleeing there with Pam recently, after the debacle with Russell Edgington. Now it was the perfect place for his witch to reside, and though he did not doubt its safety—no vampire would be able to enter it now, regardless—he did have to wonder about the coat she'd found. He'd instructed her not to touch it, and though he knew there was some logical explanation for how the thing ended up in his closet, it still made him a little uneasy.

The second explanation was Sasha Buckley's vampires. Had Malachi, the King of California, played some role in securing her passage into the city? If he had, it did not please Eric. If the King had done so, it was with the likely intention of undermining Eric's claim over the witch, perhaps to show Sasha how even from the other side of the country, he was able to provide for her. The truth of the matter was, Eric did not trust Sasha's opinion on the King of California. She venerated him so obviously that he thought her judgment was clouded by her affection for him, so much so that Eric believed it forbade her from seeming Malachi's true intentions.

Therefore, Eric's money was on Malachi. Sasha did not need to know that just yet, because just the thought of her puffing up like an angry little kitten to come to the defense of the vampire king make Eric's eyes roll. Thanks to Sasha, Malachi had known of her travel to Manhattan, and as a King, he would have had an easier time of getting the Queen's attention than Eric, quickly and easily. He would have also had more than enough wealth in his coffers to pay the Queen off for letting Sasha reside in his city. Perhaps the coat in the apartment had been a message to Sasha, a reminder of his goodwill and beneficence—albeit not a very good one, as Sasha had been more freaked out by the finding than pleased.

His phone chimed; it was the witch herself.

 _Meeting with de Fleur. Wish me luck._

Eric noted the time of the message, and then sent a reply back suggesting that she send him a text every hour that she was out of the apartment just in case.

The matter of the witch settled for now, Eric dressed in one of the many dark outfits that he had packed away. He placed the cell phone in the inside breast pocket, set to vibrate so that he'd feel it, and after some mental maneuvering, he did something similar with the bond he had with the witch; her every emotion was set on the back burner, the channel between them open to only the more intense emotions she might feel: fear and anger, namely, as well pain.

The first stop on the tour de force was New Orleans, and that had been at Eric's own suggestion. Sophie-Ann's estate, though deserted, had never been properly dealt with as Bill had spent time restoring Compton Manor in Bon Temps. Eric suggested that they deal with that first. Though Bill Compton was not a complete idiot, the vampire had always been a follower rather than a leader, in matters of war and business. He had little experience managing such a concentration of vampires—to be fair, few did. But he was open to listening to Eric's advice, something Eric planned on using to his own advantage

The plan? Maneuver Bill fucking Compton out of Bon Temps and as far away as possible from to, say, New Orleans.

Eric found Bill in the former Queen's study, surrounded by a mess of papers and what appeared to be overdue bills. It seemed that even in true death, Queen Sophie-Ann was haunted by her finances.

"It is a wonder that Sophie-Ann was able to lead for as long as she did," said Bill, not bothering to look up as he moved a stack of papers from one side of a desk to another. "This is…even I had not realized how dire the situation was. There are debts here that did not die along with her; she tied her personal wealth and matters to the crown's treasuries,"

"It's a wonder that Sophie-Ann was in this situation at all," contradicted Eric delicately. He stepped up to the desk, scanning the topmost documents before shooting a sly smile at Bill. When Bill's grim expression said that no, he did not know what Eric was implying, Eric's smile widened.

"Sophie-Ann was a great many things, and in this century greedy and a voracious spender topped the list," said Eric. "Perhaps she was still young to fall to such pitfalls, but when a vampire crosses the five-hundred year mark and starts to approach my age…if they are not careful they are known to entrap themselves in those sins humans in their churches like to warn each other about. Traits like gluttony and greed have far greater consequences in a vampire,"

Eric tossed the bills he held in his hand down onto the desk, taking a careless position in the armchair across from Bill's desk.

"Most monarchs tend to still have a Sheriff beneath them, to run the day-to-day business that a monarch cannot or does not want to attend to," explained Eric. "Just as you have me to manage Area Five. But in her greed, Sophie-Ann wanted to cut out any middleman between her and this city's profits, and so she chose to oversee the Area entirely herself. Things started falling through the cracks, obviously,"

Here Eric made a sweeping gesture towards the desk. "She was smart enough to take New Orleans as her own; thanks to its status as _vampire mecca_ ," Eric rolled his eyes. "It rakes in as much profit as the first three Areas combined—well, when ran correctly,"

He fell quiet, watching as the cogs turned slowly in Bill's brain. Eric knew that thus far his reign had been consumed with pleasing the AVL (he owed them, for putting him in power after all) and therefore his primary concern had been in garnering public human support and putting on a good face as a wealthy Louisiana vampire with a propensity for human charity and vampire rights. That had also been about where he'd started to lose much of the faith of his own subjects.

Now that he was free to focus more on his own kingdom and desires, Eric knew that even a vampire like Bill Compton had to have a modicum of desire for enterprise. And Eric had just casually laid out an available opportunity to build a very wealthy empire.

"I see," said Bill.

"Therefore, that will be the most important decision for Sheriff you make," went on Eric. "The vampire that you place in this Area will see a significant change in wealth and even status. Sophie-Ann spent so long here that, even with her demise, the city's association in the vampire world remains that it is a seat of great power. You'll want to be sure the vampire you place here remains loyal to you and only you, and doesn't get any funny ideas about who's running Louisiana,"

Bill was digesting this information with a thoughtful expression, if one that was a bit startled. Clearly Eric had given him a lot to think about, things that he had yet to consider. Eric had to wonder; was Bill up to snuff?

"Thank you Eric," said Bill after a time, if a bit curtly. "I will keep that under consideration as I appoint new Sheriffs,"

"Excellent," said Eric. "What are your wishes, until then?"

"I wish to ascertain the full amount of Sophie-Ann's spending, see what debts of hers the monarchy must now absorb. The IRS is still after her, and the humans still do not know that she is dead. I want to come up with my own plan to pay off any debts Louisiana owes, and to see if there is a way to rework her taxation. It occurs to me now that so many vampires and so many of Louisiana's Sheriffs might have felt disloyal to Sophie-Ann on account of her taxes. They seem quite high, yes?"

"Some of the highest in the country," said Eric, not bothering to hide his distaste. "I assure you so from personal experience. I'd go so far as to say that it was part of the reason we saw such a low influx of vampires arriving, and so many choosing to leave the state,"

"I thought so," Bill nodded. "This will be an important step in securing the trust of the Louisiana vampires—that I won't use my kingship to bleed them try,"

The vampires shared a smirk at his expression.

* * *

Emmett de Fleur lived in Harlem—and, Sasha noted, as far as physically possible from the royal palace of the Vampire Queen of Manhattan. Coincidence? She did not make mention of this during the cramped cab ride over, sitting quietly instead between the two tall men, the German and Cousin Emmett. It was not the most comfortable car ride.

Sasha wasn't sure if it was the revelation that she was a Fire Affinity, or that she was related to Collette Montgomery, but Emmett had been quick to spirit them all away from the Milkshake Shack Shop and into a cab heading towards Upper Manhattan.

Emmett lived in an old apartment building that had seen plenty of renovations on the inside, so that past the lobby it resembled a boarding house. Emmett explained that his apartments were on the topmost floor, and that the rest of the building housed witches; some permanently, others when they needed a place to crash. Community outreach, Nikolas said proudly, was one of the coven's mandates (magical community, that was) and so they helped locate young or unknown witches in the city and in some cases, explain what they were when some had no idea they'd been born magical.

A few curious heads glanced their way when they walked through the lobby; it looked more like a cozy common room at a fancy boarding school than an apartment complex. A few witches went so far as twisting around in their armchairs to get a good look as she was ushered to the elevator.

There was no tour of the expansive apartment, no idle chitchat; although Sasha did learn that Emmett had an affinity for velvet and dark cherry wood simply from the walk from the elevator to his office. The office, like the hall and the peek she'd caught of a living room, was a space decorated in rich velvets and dark cherry wood. Gold accents on the picture frames and lamps weighed down the overall décor; this was not a modest warlock. Most interesting in the room, aside from the wall of books behind the enormous desk was the stack of shelves behind the chair Emmett had taken. Each was carefully lined with candles.

"You'll excuse my words from earlier, I hope," said Emmett, dragging her attention away from her surroundings. "But I was curious to see how you'd react,"

"Excuse you because you didn't mean what you said, or excuse you because you meant what you said but weren't sure how else to provoke me?" Sasha asked tersely.

Emmett said nothing at first; instead her waved a careless hand over his shoulder, and the candles along the shelf behind him all lit. Having the soft glow of the combined candles through him into a little darkness. She resisted the urge to roll her eyes.

It was hard to get intimidating by a little trick like that; she'd lit her whole house on fire in her _sleep_ , and then subsequently burned two vampires alive. The only thing Sasha truly feared these days was herself, and for the first time she realized the leverage that fact lent her.

"Trust is very hard to come by these days, Sasha Buckley," said Emmett de Fleur. "And my coven places a great deal of it in me. I lead them you see, and I am therefore responsible for them. The vampire queen might have given you her permission to reside in her territory, but it is _me_ you have to convince before any witch or warlock in the city will aid you in your quest,"

"I understand," said Sasha. "And?"

"And you'll also understand why I am very weary of you. Nothing about you makes sense to me," said Emmett with a shrug as he leaned back in his seat. "Here you are, supposedly the granddaughter of a sworn vampire hater, yet you belong to a vampire. Here you are, sent by a fellow witch, yet she is dead. And here you are, saying you have no knowledge of the craft, and yet you wear protection spells so complex they require a mastery of the craft,"

If Emmett had not been looking right at her, Sasha would have smiled triumphantly. But she thought that might appear somewhat suspicious, and so she bit the inside of her cheek to keep from varying, and instead smooth her hands down the lapels of her velvet coat.

"I didn't enchant this," said Sasha. "It was a gift,"

Not that she knew who it was from, anyway. But now her suspicions about the sort of magic that was on the coat were confirmed at least; it was an enchanted item, protecting her as she wore it. Emmett didn't need to know all that, and hopefully he would assume that it was a gift from her vampire.

She was right.

"An expensive gift. Such powerful witchcraft would fetch for a high price. Then again," and here his eyes swept over her. "You seem very comfortable in designer threads,"

If he was trying to insinuate something—that perhaps her relationship with a vampire wasn't entirely one-sided, she decided she would play dumb. Sasha thought it best to keep her relationship with Eric (or lack there of) as vague as possible.

"A girl likes to shop," Sasha said with a shrug. "Did you really bring me across the city to ask where I got my shoes?"

Emmett flashed her a pearly white smile; the gold rings on his fingers glinted in the candle light as he held his hands up in concession. "So you didn't enchant the jacket. The other things I mentioned?"

"My grandmother _is_ Cookie Montgomery," said Sasha. "But I only met her recently or at least, only recently met her ghost."

"Ah. I was unaware she was still with us as a spirit," said Emmett. Sasha could tell that he did not like being in the dark. "And she knows about your vampire?"

"She doesn't like it. And I understand why any witch would be weary of a relationship with a vampire," Sasha shrugged. "I don't live my life as an example for others. I do what works for me; this arrangement works for me,"

"And yet something still doesn't sit well with me," said Emmett, shaking his head. "This vampire of yours, does he—he?—yes does he know you are a Fire Affinity?"

"He didn't at first," Sasha admitted. "I myself didn't know until recently, until Cookie tested me. The vampire, Eric, found out when I burned my house down to the ground,"

"I see…" Emmett de Fleur grew quiet, staring off for a long moment. "A vampire in control of a Fire Affinity…you can see why I'm weary of such a thing,"

"What, exactly, are you so afraid of? Queen Salma authorized my presence here in the city—so that clearly means she doesn't view me as a threat to her territory. You reside in her territory, and so your concerns would be shared. If the Queen doesn't think a foreign vampire is trying to raise a Fire Affinity to use against her in a claim for her throne, just what are you so afraid of?" asked Sasha curiously.

Emmett clicked his nails on the wooden armrest of his chair. "One can never be too careful, Miss Sasha. Tell me, does the Queen know of your affinity?"

"I got the sense that she knew more than I told her," said Sasha. "But I don't think she knew that particular. I'm sure she'll find out sooner or later. My hope is that she finds out because your coven are terrible gossips, not because I've accidentally burnt down half of Central Park,"

The witch raised his eyebrows. "That a threat?"

Oops. Time to change tactics.

"Hardly. As I said before, I'm concerned. I'm not here because a vampire wants to make a power play—of course Eric wants to have a trained witch on retainer. Fully trained, I'd be very valuable to him, and being valuable to a vampire like him can be very valuable to someone like me. I'm a covenless witch, an untrained one at that. I know that makes me a vulnerable to all sorts of threats. The world is getting smaller; I don't even know that its vampires that are the biggest threat looming on the horizon,"

"My first priority isn't even witchcraft—right now I'm mostly worried about the Fire. It's…I don't know another Fire Affinity, so I have no one to compare notes with, but I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to hear a fire speak,"

He'd shown less of a reaction when she'd lit his sleeve on fire at the milkshake shop. Emmett was leaning forward, elbows on his knees, his cool broken for the first time since they'd sat down. "You _heard_ Fire?"

Sasha nodded; had she been wrong to share that bit of information.

Emmett murmured a few words, and a candle flew off the shelf to float between them. He gestured to it.

"Can you hear anything now?"

Sasha squinted at the tiny flame for a moment. "Unless it's giggling at me, all I hear is crackling,"

He nodded, and then leaned forward to blow the candle out. "Light this,"

"Does this mean you're going to help me?" asked Sasha.

"This means I'm going to assess you," said Emmett. "And we'll see from there,"

Sasha glanced back to the blackened candlewick, weighing his words. It didn't really seem like she had a choice. Then again, what had she been expecting? Hogwarts? Where she could just sign up for different classes, make a few friends, solve a couple of mysteries while she was at it?

Sucking in a deep breath (she was pretty sure the ouroboros tattoo had encircled her waist, and was quite possibly tickling her ribcage in response to her growing anxiety) Sasha stared hard at the candlewick. The last thing she wanted to do was start a fire, and it showed. She could squint her eyes and wiggle her ears and twitch her nose all she wanted, but the wick stayed blackened and unlit.

"I can't," said Sasha. Emmett's eyes narrowed.

"You can't or you won't?"

Sasha sighed. She didn't like this Emmett character all that much, and she wondered how someone she couldn't even get along with was supposed to help her mellow out enough to get control over her Affinity—hell, she was even starting to miss Cookie's lessons, and Emmett hadn't even formally begun his yet!

"I don't know, maybe both," said Sasha. "Look, the last time I got a fire going—and I don't mean that little one back at the milkshake place—it was really, really bad. And I had no control over it,"

"Explain,"

And so she did—sort of. Sasha glossed over a lot of details—such as the fact that she had killed two vampires in the warehouse, and that Alcide Herveaux, a very handsome and very kind werewolf, had been involved. She didn't mention Pam's abduction either. She also conveniently left out that Eric had rushed in to talk her down, and that he too had been unharmed.

"And you were unharmed?" asked Emmett. His expression had darkened somewhat, like he didn't like what he was hearing at all.

"Uh, no," said Sasha. "But I mean, I guess that makes sense, right? Since we're Fire Affinities?"

"A Water Affinity will still drown, just as an Earth Affinity cannot withstand poison. A Fire Affinity can still burn," said Emmett gravely. "Cleverness and a firm command of their power can prevent their deaths at the hand of either, but not the mere state of being,"

Standing this time, Emmett walked over to the wall of candles. He grabbed another candle—this one in a tin container, with a taller flame, and brought it back to her seat. He touched the candle, wincing as his finger made contact with the flame. When he pulled it away, a blister had already begun to form.

"Now you try," said Emmett.

Sasha lifted an eyebrow at him; had the man lost his mind? Sasha didn't care what superpower type of shit she'd been on that night in the warehouse—she was pretty sure that touching this fire now would burn her. Even a minor burn was annoying and painful, and she didn't see the point in proving what she already knew. She'd burn.

 _Eric walked into that warehouse_ , thought Sasha. _He walked in trusting you would not allow him to burn. Why don't you trust yourself as much as he trusts you?_

Feeling a surge of confidence, Sasha reached forward, placing her hand on the open flame. She kept waiting for the inevitable stinging pain of her burning palm—but it never came.

"Oh!" she exclaimed excitedly. But her excitement seemed to be the very literal spark, and soon her whole hand was wrapped up in fire. " _Shit_!"  
Emmett snapped his fingers, and Sasha wondered just what the hell that was supposed to do to help. But she was more preoccupied with the flame that was climbing up her arm—whether because of her own magic or the enchantments in the fabric, her coat remained unharmed. The same could not be said for the chair she sat in. The leather was melting away, the wood arm rests scorching.

Just as had happened that night in the warehouse, a word came to the tip of her tongue. She didn't stop to think about it—where the word have come from, much less what it meant as she shouted it at the fire twisting up her arm and shoulder.

" _Arsálu!"_

The fire died insantly.

"What was that? That thing you said?" Emmett said quickly. He was hovering over her, his hand raised high and poised like he was going to snap his fingers again.

 _Gee, thanks for the help!_ Sasha thought to herself. Instead she pushed her curly hair out of her face. Sweat had collected at her forehead, and she suddenly wished she had thought to put a stick of deodorant on her purse. "What did I say?"

"That language you spoke, just now, to make the fire stop," said Emmett.

"Language—what language?" Sasha asked, dumbfounded. "I think I would know if I'd spoken another language,"

"Arslu, Arsaloo?" Emmett said. "Something like that,"

She was saved answering by her phone vibrating in her pocket. Sasha took it out simply to avoid having to meet Emmett's gaze, and she found that she'd missed three calls in the last minute. _Eric._

Straightening up and wiping a few wisps of hair that had clung to her lipgloss with the little dignity she had left, she announced, "I have to take this call,"

Even Emmett looked a little frazzled. He straightened his tie, nodding slowly.

"I'll do it. I'll help you find control over your power," said Emmett. "We host gatherings, here, too. If you come Monday night at sundown, I'll introduce you to Marion. She leads our novices,"

Still clutching her vibrating phone, Sasha smiled half-heartedly, jutting her chin towards the ruined chair. "Sorry about the furniture,"

Emmett chuckled. "Yeah, I'm sure."

* * *

 **Hi guys! Unfortunately it seems that I've lost a lot of reviewers, despite the fact that there are still readers. My Christmas wish is that y'all start talking to me again lol**


End file.
